THE 

HURCH  REVIVAL 

S.  BARING -GOULD 


BX  5099    .B3  1914 
Baring-Gould ,  Sabine . 
The  church  revival 


Digitized  by 

the  Internet  Archive 

in  2015 

https://archive.org/details/churchrevivalthoOObari 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


THE 


CHURCH  REVIVAL 

THOUGHTS  THEREON 
AND  REMINISCENCES 


>/  BY 

S.  BARING-GOULD,  M.A. 

AUTHOR  OF  "THE  TRAGEDY  OF  THE  (LESARS,"  ETC. 


"  Ecclesia  videtur  sicut  luna  deficere,  sed  non  deficit ; 
obumbrari  potest,  deficere  non  potest" 

S.  Ambrose,  Hex.  IV.  2 


WITH  EIGHTEEN  ILLUSTRATIONS 


NEW  YORK 
E.  P.  DUTTON  AND  COMPANY 
PUBLISHERS 


TO 


TWO  FRIENDS  OF  MY  OWN  GENERATION: 
THE  REV.  J.  T.  FOWLER,  HON.  CANON  OF 
DURHAM  AND  HEBREW  LECTURER  TO  THE 
UNIVERSITY  OF  DURHAM,  M.A.,  HON.  D.C.L., 
F.S.A.  J  AND  THE  REV.  J.  M.  GATRILL,  LATE 
VICAR  OF  ALL  SAINTS',   STAN  WAY 


PREFACE 


I HAD  no  intention,  in  writing  my  Reminiscences,  and 
Thoughts  on  the  Church  Revival,  of  having  them  pub- 
lished before  my  death.  When  this  appears  I  shall  be  in 
my  eighty-first  year,  and  I  have  passed  through  many  ex- 
periences during  the  second  stage  of  the  Church  Revival.  Memoirs 
and  Recollections  have  been  issued  from  the  press  relative  to 
the  first,  or  Tractarian  stage,  but  none,  so  far  as  I  can  learn, 
that  concerns  the  second  epoch,  that  termed,  first,  Puseyite 
and  then  Ritualistic,  except  detached  Biographies,  and  records 
concerning  particular  churches.1 

I  say  that  I  did  not  desire  to  publish,  but  leave  my  MS.  to 
appear  later,  because  I  was  reluctant  to  hurt  the  feelings  of 
sons  and  grandsons  of  some  of  whom  I  have  had  to  say  hard 
words.  But  I  have  been  strongly  urged  to  produce  the  work 
at  once,  because  of  late  there  has  been  a  recrudescence  of  seces- 
sions to  Rome  of  young  clergy,  impatient  at  the  slow  progress 
of  the  movement — above  all  at  the  favour  shown  to,  and  the 
advancement  made  to  responsible  positions  in  the  Church,  of 
men  whose  grasp  on  the  fundamentals  of  the  Christian  faith  is 
more  than  doubtful. 

In  this  book  I  desire  especially  to  show  the  younger  clergy 
that  the  trials  and  discouragements  through  which  loyally- 
minded  Churchmen  had  to  pass  formerly  were  far  more  serious 
than  any  which  they  are  called  upon  to  endure  at  the  present 
day. 

If  I  have  had  to  deal  somewhat  severely  with  the  Bishops  of 
the  Victorian  period,  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  they  laid 
themselves  out  for  condemnation.    When  one  looks  back  on  the 

1  I  must,  however,  except  Mr.  Overton's  excellent  book,  The  Anglican 
Revival  (London,  1897).  H  is.  however,  very  brief,  and  more  than  half 
is  devoted  to  the  Tractarian  movement. 

vii 


viii 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


hearts  they  broke,  the  hopes  they  extinguished,  the  bitterness 
of  soul  they  engendered,  the  wreckage  they  wrought  in  the 
Church  of  England,  wheresoever  work  was  being  done  for  God 
not  exactly  after  the  pattern  with  which  they  were  familiar 
and  in  the  fashion  that  they  approved,  and  how  they  were  able 
to  throw  a  bomb  and  thrust  in  a  torch  to  destroy  loyal  work, 
then  the  fire  kindles  and  one  speaks  with  the  tongue.  That 
they  did  not  understand  the  movement  towards  fuller  doctrine 
and  more  reverent  ceremonial  may  well  and  readily  be  conceded, 
but  that  which  cannot  be  excused  is  where  they  endeavoured 
to  hinder  or  wholly  prevent  the  Church  from  recovering  her 
voice  in  Convocation,  and  in  Synodal  action,  in  a  word  from 
recovering  her  vitality,  and  also  for  obstructing  the  commissioning 
of  Bishops  to  act  as  heads  of  Missions  beyond  the  bounds  of  our 
Colonies,  and  for  endeavouring  to  rivet  on  them  the  chains  of 
the  Royal  Supremacy  and  the  Judgments  of  the  Court  of  the 
Privy  Council. 

A  friend  once  showed  an  old  Turk  an  engraving  of  Noah's 
sacrifice,  highly  idealised.  The  Ark,  looking  like  a  mastless 
old  three-decker  battleship,  was  in  the  background,  and  the 
elephants,  giraffes,  lions,  tigers  and  lambs  were  represented 
walking  lovingly  in  conjunction  out  of  the  sally-port,  like  a 
lady's  seminary  taking  a  constitutional.  "  Ah  !  "  said  the  old 
Turk,  "  if  only  we  had  a  photograph  of  it  as  it  really  was  !  " 
In  the  future,  maybe,  we  shall  have  the  Victorian  archbishops 
and  bishops  idealised,  delineated  like  apostles  in  stained  glass 
with  haloes  about  their  heads.  I  see  from  an  article  in  the 
Dictionary  of  National  Biography  that  the  halo  is  beginning 
to  form  even  about  Archbishop  Thomson.  Already  Bishops 
Sumner,  Bickersteth,  Thorold,  etc.,  have  undergone  beatifica- 
tion at  the  hands  of  admiring  but  uncritical  biographers. 

I  have  ventured  to  sketch  some  of  these  men.  I  do  not  for 
a  moment  mean  to  imply  that  they  did  not  act  conscientiously. 
I  believe  that  Annas  and  Caiaphas  were  sincerely  conscientious 
men.   Only  they  knew  not  what  they  did.   That  is  their  excuse. 

I  find  that  among  the  younger  clergy  there  is  a  growing 
impatience  at  the  galling  link  between  Church  and  State,  and 
the  impotence  in  which  the  Church  is  placed  to  select  her  own 
officers  and  manage  her  own  affairs  ;  and  there  is  a  readiness  to 
accept  Disestablishment  at  almost  any  price. 

I  do  not  wonder  at  it.  From  the  time  of  the  English  Revolu- 
tion, insult  and  outrage  have  been  assiduously  offered  to  the 


PREFACE 


ix 


Church,  and  every  effort  has  been  made  to  depress  and  cripple 
her,  and  force  her  to  work  as  her  taskmaster  orders,  in  chains, 
and  with  the  irons  eating  into  her  very  soul. 

One  of  our  present  bishops  is  reported  to  have  said  :  "  When 
I  travel  I  always  get  into  a  carriage  in  the  middle  of  the 
train,  and  I  take  a  middle  compartment,  and  plant  myself 
in  the  middle  seat,  and  trust  the  rest  to  Providence."  This 
represents  precisely  the  policy  of  a  great  many — not  all — of 
our  prelates.  They  do  not  want  to  lead,  they  do  not  want 
either  to  come  in  at  the  tail,  but  to  occupy  a  position  that 
exposes  them  to  no  danger  or  discomfort.  What  they  look  for 
is  to  be  safe — safe  in  the  middle  compartment,  with  a  buffer  on 
each  side,  so  that  whatever  might  befall  the  train  in  which  they 
travel — the  Church  of  the  Land — they  personally  will  not  suffer. 

In  the  first  two  chapters  I  have  endeavoured  to  trace  the 
history  of  the  parties  in  the  Church  to  their  sources,  and  to 
show  how  that  Puritanism  was  a  foreign  element  introduced 
into  England.  I  have  endeavoured  also  to  show  how  that  the 
Church  has  been  like  a  cask  half-full  of  generous  wine,  into 
which  the  State,  like  a  dishonest  host,  has  poured  so  as  to  fill 
the  cask  the  water  of  Latitudinarianism  charged  with  evil,  as 
much  as  it  would  hold ;  and  how  that  the  Church  movement  has 
been  the  fermentation  of  the  noble  liquor,  endeavouring  to  clear 
itself  of  its  impurities. 

As  a  history  of  the  Church  in  the  Victorian  age,  my  Reminis- 
cences will  not  serve.  They  are  rather  a  collection  of  disjointed 
notes  on  various  matters  connected  with  the  movement,  than 
anything  of  the  nature  of  a  consecutive  history.  I  have  dealt 
mainly  with  such  events  as  came  under  my  own  immediate 
notice  or  with  which  close  friends  had  been  associated. 

Here  and  there  I  have  incorporated  into  the  text  passages 
from  articles  I  had  contributed  to  the  Guardian. 

I  have  ventured  also  to  reproduce  certain  caricatures  that 
appeared  at  intervals,  also  satirical  verses  that  circulated,  some 
in  print,  and  some  in  MS. ;  moreover  I  have  given  the  texts 
applied  by  the  late  Dr.  Littledale  to  the  Victorian  Bishops. 
All  these  items,  trivial  and  even  flippant,  deserve  preservation 
as  illustrative  of  the  feelings  and  passions  excited  on  one  side 
as  on  the  other  by  the  Church  Revival  j  and  such  in  a  few  years 
would  be  difficult,  almost  impossible  to  recover ;  and  this  must 
serve  as  my  apology  for  their  introduction.  I  may,  like  Autolicus, 
be  a  snapper  up  of  unconsidered  trifles,  but  it  is  precisely  these 


X 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


trifles  that  tell  most  of  the  temper  of  the  times  when  they  were 
cast  aside. 

Vive,  vale  :  si  quid  novisti  rectius  istis, 
Candidus  imperti ;  si  non,  his  utere  mecum. 

I  have  to  thank  three  old  friends,  of  the  same  age  as  myself, 
for  their  advice  in  the  compilation  of  this  book,  and  for  having 
read  it  over  in  MS.  They  are  not,  however,  to  be  held  responsible 
for  my  statements,  censures,  or  opinions.  I  must  also  thank 
several  laymen  and  clergy  who  have  furnished  me  with  details 
relative  to  the  imprisonment  of  clergy  under  the  P.W.R.  Act. 
Also  Mr.  Mowbray,  for  kindly  permitting  the  reproduction  of 
one  of  the  plates  of  Deformation  and  Reformation,  drawn  by 
his  father  in  the  forties. 

S.  Baring-Gould 


Lew  Trenchard,  Devon. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  I 

THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH 
1547— 1660 

A  survey  of  the  history  from  the  death  of  Henry  VIII — Edward  VI — 
The  First  Prayer  Book — Protector  Somerset  and  the  Council — Influx  of 
foreigners — Revision  of  the  Prayer  Book — The  unpopularity  of  the  Reform 
— Tyndale's  Bible — The  Homilies — Insurrection — Preaching  forbidden — 
Censorship  of  the  Press — Foreign  reformers  in  England — Reformers  on 
the  Continent — Their  advice  solicited  and  tendered — The  Second  Prayer 
Book — Accession  of  Mary — Ejection  of  married  incumbents — Death  of 
Mary  and  accession  of  Elizabeth — Return  of  the  exiles — Inundation 
of  foreigners — The  Prayer  Book  of  Elizabeth — Peter  Martyr's  advice — 
Foreigners'  advice  still  sought — Puritan  demands — The  XXXIX  Articles 
— Oath  of  Supremacy — Visitation  of  England — Small  number  of  clergy 
ejected — Most  of  Marian  priests  remained  in  their  cures — Little  outward 
difference  in  the  conduct  of  worship — Confusion — Encouragement  of 
Puritan  clergy — Unworthy  Bishops — Difference  between  condition  of  the 
Church  under  Elizabeth  from  what  it  was  under  Edward — Emmanuel 
College — Two  currents  between  the  same  banks — The  turn  of  the  tide 
— Bancroft,  Jewel  and  Hooker — Differences  of  use — Contrasts — Iceland 
— Abuses — The  lectureships — Encouragement  given  to  Puritans — Attempts 
to  restrain  them — The  classes — Prophesyings — Millenary  petition — Pre- 
sentations of  clergy  by  churchwardens — Petition  of  February,  1640 — 
Appointment  of  committees — Ejection  of  clergy — in  Monmouthshire — in 
Devon — Religious  anarchy — Devastation  of  churches — The  Directory — 
Destruction  of  organs — Conformists — The  Covenant — Presbyterianism 
established — Independency — The  Tryers — Severity  towards  the  deprived 
clergy — Reykjahlid  Church       .        .        .        .        .        .      pp.  1-27 

CHAPTER  II 
THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  (continued) 

FROM  1660  ONWARDS 

The  Restoration  of  1660 — Pepys — Savoy  Conference,  1661 — Black 
Bartholomew — Number  of  those  ejected  and  of  conformists — Difficulties 
of  the  bishops — Conformists  did  well  for  themselves — Conceived  prayers 
— Dean  Granville — Test  Act — Neglect  of  order  not  due  solely  to  the  con- 

xi 


xii 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


formists — Ejections  in  Cumberland  and  Westmorland — Restoration — 
Revolution — William  III  and  his  Bishops — Commission  of  1689 — Lower 
House  of  Convocation  refuses  all  modification  of  the  Prayer  Book — Sub- 
serviency of  the  Bishops — Reign  of  Queen  Anne — Influx  of  foreign  Cal- 
vinists — Favoured  with  deaneries,  canonries  and  livings — Ennoblement  of 
Huguenots — The  Channel  Islands — Invasion  from  Switzerland — Calvinists 
from  the  Palatinate — Influx  of  Scotchmen — Invasion  of  the  Church  by 
them — and  by  Irish  Protestants — Submergence  of  the  English  Church. 

pp.  28-49 

CHAPTER  III 
A  REMNANT 

Livings  in  private  patronage — Orthodox  clergy  regarded  with  suspicion 
— Convocation  silenced  in  171 7 — No  preferments  for  the  Orthodox  clergy 
— They  were  to  be  found  in  country  livings — The  Church  waterlogged — 
A  blank  in  Church  history — Character  of  the  Hanoverian  Bishops — Two 
elements  in  the  Church — The  Taliacotian  process  applied  to  her — The 
squatters — Foreigners  in  the  ministry — The  Church  not  radically  corrupted 
— The  Cagots — Faithful  clergy  remained — The  thread  of  Catholicity 
unbroken — The  Catholic -minded  Bishops  and  clergy  of  the  reigns  of 
James  I  and  Charles  I — Post-reformation  screens  in  Devon — in  Somerset — 
The  Communion  Service  sung — The  orthodox  at  the  Restoration — Arch- 
bishop Sharp — The  Catholic  element  during  the  Hanoverian  night — 
Bishop  Wilson — Writers — The  Apostolic  Succession — Declaration  of  clergy 
and  laity  after  the  Reform  Bill — The  Exeter  synod — Belford  Regis — The 
great  default  of  the  High  Churchmen  of  that  day — Those  in  my  own 
neighbourhood — No  Church  so  badly  oppressed  as  that  of  England — The 
Tract  writers — The  Rev.  Charles  Baring-Gould — The  Rev.  F.  Parker — 
Coryton — Madam  Gould  and  Charles  Baring — Sir  Roger  de  Coverley — 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Fowler — Latent  Catholicism — Publication  of  the  Christian 
Year — Nelson's  Fasts  and  Festivals — The  Hellenising  of  the  Jewish  Church 
under  Antiochus  Epiphanes — The  Abomination  of  Desolation — Revival 
under  the  Maccabees — The  Analogy    .....    pp.  50-77 

CHAPTER  IV 
THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT 

The  foreign  element  in  the  Church — The  fundamental  doctrines  of 
Calvinism — The  Omphalopsychae — The  undenominational  temper — The 
old  sense  of  duty — Failure  of  orthodox  teaching — The  Evangelicals  rill 
the  gap — Exaggerations  of  doctrine — Sensible  conversion — Emancipation 
from  responsibility — Mr  Mozley  on  this  teaching — The  doctrine  of  the 
utter  degradation  of  man — Mussulman  and  Calvinistic  Predestination — 
Opposition  to  the  world — Whitefield's  preaching — Romaine — The  elder 
Evangelicals — Later,  more  narrow — Their  imperfect  conception  of  the 
Church — Oppose   Church   developments — Contrast   in   the   Colonies — 


CONTENTS 


xiii 


Australia  and  South  Africa — Verbal  inspiration — The  Nemesis  of  Faith 
— Their  doctrine  unscriptural — Idea  that  Rome  is  Babylon — Results — 
Preaching  everything — Neglect  of  parochial  work — Falling  off  when 
Evangelicalism  became  fashionable — Attempt  to  revise  the  Prayer  Book — 
Lord  Shaftesbury — Diary  of  John  Louis  Mallet — The  Baring  family — Mrs. 
Wall — Mr.  Evans  and  Mr.  Snow — Mrs.  Wall's  brothers — Rev.  Mr.  Cun- 
ningham— And  Denman — Meets  Lord  Lansdowne — Gets  snubbed — Top- 
lady — Self-deception — Hood  and  Rae  Wilson — Rev.  Mr.  Simcoe — Visit 
to  a  Calvinist  incumbent — Islington  and  Clapham — The  Clapham  sect — 
What  idolatry  really  is — Tenets  of  Calvinism  generally  given  up — What  we 
owe  to  the  Evangelicals — Sunday  Schools — Hymns — Fervour  in  preaching 
— Objections  to  Colonial  bishoprics — Removed — These  become  a  prey  to  the 
C.M.S. — "  Returned  Empties  " — Feebleness — How  Evangelicals  regarded 
by  Dissenters — Craving  after  popularity — Need  of  the  party  still  in  the 
Church — One  party  incomplete  without  the  other      .        .    pp.  78-1 11 

CHAPTER  V 
THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES 

Statistics  of  non-residence  in  1807 — In  1835 — The  occasion  for  non- 
residence — Pluralism  not  confined  to  England  or  Hanoverian  period — 
Difficulties  in  the  way  of  residence — Grant  of  1818 — Tithe  Commutation 
Act — Patronage — Family  livings — Froude  on  the  clergy  of  his  day — 
Unfair  judgment — The  practice  in  country  parishes — Parson  Teasdale — 
The  "  Velvet  Cushion  " — Praed's  testimony — Pluralists — Lord  Courtenay 
and  his  livings — The  curate — Two  classes  of  clergy — Washington  Irving's 
account — Systematic  pillage  of  livings — The  parish  of  Lydford — Parson 
Elford — Caddy  Thomas  and  his  pupil — East  Mersea — Hannah  More's 
testimony — Dean  Hole's — Stamford — Change  in  the  Church — Belford 
Regis — Preparation  for  Confirmation — A  visitation  at  Farnham — Con- 
firmations and  Ordinations — Sheepstor — Infrequency  of  the  Communion 
— Types  of  old  parsons — One  Cornish,  the  other  Yorkshire — Easter 
decorations — Condition  of  the  churches — A  church  near  Cambridge — 
Ruinous  condition  of  the  churches — Lew  Trenchard  Church — The  service 
— The  hunting  parsons — Parson  Endacott — The  Bishops — A  procession 
— Another  at  Lyndhurst — Behaviour  of  Bishops — Clergy  in  procession — 
The  north  end — Reduction  of  sleeves  among  the  Bishops.     pp.  11 2-1 39 

CHAPTER  VI 
THE  CHURCH  IN  TOWNS 

Town  churches  kept  clean  and  comfortable — Attitude  in  prayer — 
Grant  of  1824  for  church -building — Ugly  churches — Appropriated  pews — 
The  pew-opener — Pulpits — Three-deckers — Proprietary  chapels — A  me- 
chanical contrivance — Windows — Galleries — David  Copperfield — Bilder 
aus  London — Rage  for  attending  church — Fashionably  dressed  men — 


xiv 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


All  men  want  to  preach — Charity  school  children — Beadles — Interior 
arrangement  of  churches — Irving — His  meeting-house — His  personal  ap- 
pearance— His  mode  of  conducting  service — Irvingism — Prophecy — Dr. 
Cumming — Certain  proprietary  chapels — Pulpit  contrivances — Charles 
Honeyman  no  caricature — Dress  of  the  clergy — Uniform — Cassocks — 
Long  coats — Now  cut  short — Importance  of  a  distinctive  dress — Adoption 
of  moustaches — Sermons — Tediousness — Too  long — Condensation  needed 

pp.  140-156 

CHAPTER  VII 
THE  TRACTARIAN  MOVEMENT 

Dealt  with  briefly — A  lull — Dr.  Arnold's  idea  of  a  Church — Dr.  C.  Lloyd 
— The  Reform  Bill — Alarm — Hadleigh  meeting — Mistaken  action  of  the 
Bishops — First  appearance  of  the  Tracts  for  the  Times — Their  purpose — 
Palmer's  Origines  LiturgiccB — Awakening  interest  in  the  Prayer  Book — 
The  Oxford  Movement — Tract  on  Reserve — Alarm  provoked — Tract 
Ninety — Its  purport — Injudiciousness  of  its  publication — The  Remains  of 
R.  Hurrell  Froude — Severe  set-back  to  the  Movement — The  Romanizers — 
Secessions — Jubilation  of  the  Evangelicals — Charges  of  treachery — Were 
they  justified  ? — Many  doctrines  ignored  or  depraved  by  the  Evangelicals 
— The  Cambridge  Camden  Society — Its  seal — Close  thereon — The  cult  of 
the  ugly — Love  of  deformity — Ridicule — Was  it  possible  to  effect  a  Revo- 
lution ?   •  pp.  157-170 

CHAPTER  VIII 
THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 

The  Victorian  bishops — Men  of  family — Or  family  tutors — How  Charles 
Sumner  got  preferment — Helped  on  his  brother — Disraeli  on  the  Peel 
bishops — Wilberforce  of  Oxford — Lord  John  Russell — His  appointments 
— Bishop  Blomfield — Lord  Palmerston  puts  appointments  into  the  hands 
of  Lord  Shaftesbury — Bishop  Jackson — Bishop  Baring — Bishop  Ellicott 
— Archbishop  Thomson — Bishop  Villiers — Bishop  Waldegrave — Bishop 
Pelham — Mr.  Swinburne  on  a  bishop  in  the  Northern  Province — Bishop 
Selwyn  —  Bishop  Jeune  —  Bishop  Perowne  —  Bishop  Philpott  —  Bishop 
Wigram — Bishop  Thorold — Tait,  Bishop  of  London — A  Presbyterian  at 
heart — Believes  it  his  mission  to  put  down  Ritualism — Becomes  Arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury — His  Bill  taken  out  of  his  hands  by  Lord  Shaftesbury 
— On  his  death-bed  tries  to  undo  some  of  the  mischief  he  had  perpe- 
trated— Bishop  Bickersteth — Lord  Beaconsfield's  bishops — Magee — Bishop 
Ryle  a  persecutor  and  a  Zwinglian — Bishop  Fraser — An  inexhaustible 
talker — Specimen  by  Mr.  Swinburne — Covering-up  of  blots — Men  of 
genius  not  wanted — Only  ordinary  men  approved  of — What  the  Palmer- 
stonian  bishops  resembled — Ignorance  of  one  of  them — Colonial  bishops 
— Anecdote  of  one — Treatment  of  Ordinands  formerly — Bishop  Bickersteth 
again — In  the  Archdiocese  of  York — The  Vicar  of  Topcliffe — Instance  of 


CONTENTS 


xv 


the  Archbishop's  practice — Appearance — At  Sheffield — Dealings  with 
myself — Bishop  Claughton — Marries  a  daughter  well — A  famous  photo- 
graph— The  Bishop  of  Colombo — Bishop  Ciaughton  at  a  farmhouse — 
Bishop  Wordsworth — Bishop  Phillpotts  of  Exeter — Not  liked  in  the  dio- 
cese— Some  anecdotes — Our  present  bishops      .        .        .    pp.  1 71-210 


CHAPTER  IX 
ROUGH  WEATHER 

Broad  Church  and  Latitudinarian  hostility — Appointment  of  Hampden 
to  Hereford — Of  Lee  to  Manchester — Bishop  Phillpotts  on  the  Tracts — 
Surplice  riots — Helston — Judgment  of  the  Bishop — S.  Sidwell's — Surplice 
riots  there — Eldad  chapel — S.  Peter's,  Plymouth — The  Vicar  of  S.  Andrew's 
— Public  meetings — Cholera — The  clergy  and  Sisters — Renewed  attack — 
Mr.  Spurrell's  pamphlet — Confirmation  at  S.  Peter's — Attack  on  the 
Sisters — Meetings  to  denounce  Confession — Charges  against  Mr.  Prynne 
and  the  Sisters — Investigation — Character  of  the  witnesses — Latimer's 
attack — Trial — Prynne's  effects  sold — Rev.  John  Mason  Neale — Sackville 
College — Visited  by  Bishop  Gilbert — Mr.  Neale  inhibited — Riot  at  the 
funeral  of  Mrs.  Aulchim — Miss  Scobell — Riot  at  Lewes — Change  of  feeling 
after  twenty  years  —  Inhibition  removed  —  Margaret  Street  Chapel  — 
S.  Barnabas,  Pimlico — Riots — The  Rev.  W.  J.  E.  Bennett  forced  to 
resign   pp.  21 1-23 1 


CHAPTER  X 

STURM  UND  DRANG 

Riots  at  S.  George's-in-the-East — Those  at  S.  Matthias,  Stoke  Newington 
— Hostility,  why  roused — Attempts  to  condemn  Eucharistic  doctrine — 
The  Denison  case — The  Bennett  case — The  Ornaments  Rubric — Consti- 
tution of  the  Judicial  Committee  of  the  Privy  Council — Beale  v.  Liddell 
— Martin  v.  Mackonochie — The  Purchas  case — The  Public  Worship 
Regulation  Act — Convocation  disapproves — The  Episcopal  veto — Lord 
Penzance  appointed  Judge  in  the  new  Court — The  Ridsdale  case — Im- 
prisonment of  clergy — S.  James's,  Hatcham,  and  Mr.  Tooth — Imprisoned 
— Released — Renewed  riots — The  Bishops  surrender  their  power  to  the 
Secular  Judge — Miles  Platting  and  Mr.  Green — Imprisoned — Resigns 
the  living  —  Dispersion  of  congregation  —  End  of  the  tyranny  —  S. 
Margaret's,  Liverpool,  and  Mr.  Bell-Cox — Imprisoned  —  Discharged 
— Bill  of  Costs — Plan  of  spiritually  starving  parishes — Inaugurated  by 
Bishop  Baring — Rev.  Dr.  Dykes — S.  Raphael's,  Bristol,  and  Dr.  Ellicott 
— Bishop  of  Lincoln's  case  —  The  Church  Association  —  Case  of  Mr. 
Mackonochie  —  Imprisonment  of  Mr.  Dale — 1874,  the  year  of  stress  — 
Secessions — Frightened  condition  of  the  Bishops — Change  of  feeling — The 
opinion  of  the  Archbishops  in  1899 — What  should  have  been  the  policy 
of  the  Bishops — "  Who  killed  devotion  ?  "       .        .        .    pp.  232-265 


xvi 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


CHAPTER  XI 
.  .  S.  SAVIOUR'S,  LEEDS 

The  story  of  a  pioneer  Church — The  "  Bank  "  district  at  Leeds — Popula- 
tion— Infidelity — Immorality — Dr.  Hook  divides  Leeds  into  thirty  parishes 
— The  Rev.  G.  Elmhurst — Dr.  Hook's  work  and  character — A  penitent's 
offer — Original  scheme — Consecration  difficulties  raised  by  the  Bishop — 
Lucy's  cross — The  church  services — Not  ritualistic — Insufficient  endow- 
ment— Dr.  Hook's  objections — The  Rev.  Richard  Ward — The  Rev.  R. 
Macmullen — His  sermon — Inhibited — Secedes — The  Bishop  obliges  Mr. 
Ward  to  resign — The  Rev.  A.  P.  Forbes  becomes  Vicar — Mr.  Minster — The 
Bishop  raises  objections — Dr.  Hook  hostile — The  Irish  Fever — The  cholera 
of  1849 — Rev.  J.  H.  Pollen  comes  to  help — Mr.  Minster  attacked — Conduct 
of  Bishop — Bishop  Longley  objects  to  Mr.  Pollen — Mr.  Minster's  health 
fails — Bishop  objects  to  Confession — Secession  of  schoolmistress — The 
Gorham  Judgment — Mr.  Ward  inhibited — Also  Mr.  Pollen — The  clergy, 
summoned  to  Ripon — The  Commission — All  the  curates  inhibited — Ad- 
dress by  congregation — Secession  of  clergy — Mr.  Beckett  remains  firm — 
Preferment  of  Bishop  Longley — Dr.  Pusey  arrives — Appointment  of  Rev. 
J.  W.  Knott — A  Revivalist — Resigns — Appointment  of  Rev.  R.  Collins — 
Period  of  stagnation — His  death — Appointment  of  Rev.  J.  Wylde — Peace 
and  progress — A  saying  of  Dr.  Newman    ....    pp.  266-289 


CHAPTER  XII 
S.  JUDE'S,  BRADFORD 

Contrast  between  S.  Saviour's,  Leeds,  and  S.  Jude's,  Bradford — The 
town  of  Bradford — Its  vicar — A  Parochial  Union  formed — Its  object — 
Broken  up — Migrates  to  S.  Jude's — Seats  made  free  and  unappropriated — 
Mission  by  Canon  Body — Inhibition  of  Rev.  A.  H.  Mackonochie — Increase 
in  the  number  of  communicants — And  in  amount  of  the  offertories — A 
Sisterhood  introduced — Mission  chapel  of  S.  Mary  Magdalen — Resignation 
of  Vicar — His  return — Opposition — How  overcome — A  layman's  Move- 
ment   pp.  290-296 


CHAPTER  XIII 
AGITATION  AGAINST  CONFESSION 

The  Boyne  Hill  case — Investigation — Punch  on  the  Bishop  of  Oxford — 
The  Road  murder — Constance  Kent — Agitation  of  1873 — Ignorance  of 
how  to  deal  with  souls — Project  of  the  403 — Bishop  Jackson  and  the 
curtains — Dean  Goulburn — Agitation  of  1877 — The  "  Priest  in  Absolu- 
tion " — Lord  Redesdale  in  the  House  of  Lords — Thanked  by  Archbishop 
Tait — Remedy  proposed  by  the  Pall  Mall  Gazette — Reason  of  opposition — 
McNeile  on  Confession — Secrecy  necessary — Dr.  Littledale  quoted — Proper 


CONTENTS 


xvii 


place  for  hearing  Confessions — Bishop  Festing — Fear  lest  it  be  made 
compulsory — Ignorance  of  clergy — The  doctrine  and  practice  of  the 
Church — Compromise  at  the  Reformation — Sackingen — The  three  parts 
of  true  repentence — Abuse — Neale  at  Amiens — Conference  at  Leeds — The 
Church  Times  on  the  Seventh  Commandment — Danger  of  men  treating 
their  own  souls — Missions,  their  work  in  awakening  souls.  .    pp.  297-308 


CHAPTER  XIV 
SECESSIONS 

Allowance  made  for  discouragement — Hostility  of  the  Bishops — Too 
early  loss  of  heart — Condition  in  the  German  bishoprics  in  the  eighteenth 
century — Episcopal  encouragement  of  Rationalism — The  parish  priests 
save  Christianity — Mistake  as  to  the  functions  of  a  Bishop — His  three 
powers  and  duties — The  Bishops  oppose  the  Church  Revival — The  Jeru- 
salem Bishopric — Protests  against  it — The  Gorham  Judgment — The  Privy 
Council  no  mouthpiece  of  the  Church — Secessions  caused  by  its  judgments 
— The  Wakefield  Bridge  cross — Motives  for  secession — Lack  of  immediate 
success — How  secessions  are  now  regarded — Romanist  statistics — Unreli- 
able— Desire  for  emancipation  from  responsibilities — "  'Verts"  not  morally 
improved — Desire  for  an  authoritative  voice — Does  the  Papacy  provide 
this  ? — The  text  Tu  es  Petrus,  etc. — The  Papal  system  based  on  a  suc- 
cession of  frauds — The  Canon  of  Sardica — The  rescript  of  Valentinian  III 
— Forged  Decretals — The  directing  and  authoritative  voice  convicted  of 
falsehood — Personal  difficulties — Admiration  for  high  ritual — Leo  X — 
Desire  for  definite  dogma — Seceders  mainly  from  Dissent  and  Evangelical- 
ism— Convictions — The  Romanizing  element — Roman  usages  uncongenial 
to  the  English       ........    pp.  309-337 


CHAPTER  XV 
PROGRESS 

Tithe  Commutation  Act — Church  rates  abolished — Progress  in  Cornwall 
— Conversions — Causes — Dissenting  chapels — Morals  in  Cornwall  and 
Wales — A  family  living — A  change  there — Bridestowe — The  Rev.  Hinds 
Howell— Mary  Tavy— Bratton  Clovelly— Plymouth— Exeter— Cambridge 
— The  Rev.  Mr.  Dodd — Liverpool — The  three  phases  of  the  Revival  : 
(1)  Appeal  to  the  cultured  and  noble,  (2)  Appeal  to  the  middle  classes 
(3)  Appeal  to  the  working  class— The  Church  and  the  workers— The  demon- 
stration of  June  21,  1 91 3— What  it  revealed— The  Movement  sporadic— 
The  Roadmenders — Increase  of  the  Episcopate — In  the  Colonies — And  at 
home — Convocation — Church  Congresses — Pan-Anglican  Synods — Sister- 
hoods—Brotherhoods—Guilds—The Church  of  England  Men's  Society— 
The  English  Church  Union — Church-building — Tokens  of  retrogression — 
Cooling  down  of  enthusiasm — Strictness  of  the  early  Tractarians  and 


xviii 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Evangelicals — Modern  relaxation — Cheapening  of  the  clergy — Dissenters 
entering  the  Church — Church  music — Hymnals — The  Archbishops'  letter 
to  Leo  XIII — Church  progress  in  the  United  States — Stagnation — The 
Irish  Church — The  Bay  of  Naples  .....      pp.  338-367 


CHAPTER  XVI 
THE  BROAD  CHURCH 

Modern  condition  of  doubt — Latitudinarianism — Endeavour  of  the 
party  to  accommodate  doctrine  to  modern  notions — Difficulties  about 
inspiration — At  the  Reformation  a  basis  sought  to  oppose  the  infallibility 
of  the  Church — This  found  in  the  infallibility  of  Scripture — Church  and 
Scripture  both  fallible  and  infallible — A  breakdown  of  faith — The  power 
of  Christianity  is  in  a  Person — The  Person  of  Jesus  Christ — Criticism — The 
memorabilia  of  the  Apostles — The  Incarnation — The  Virginal  Birth — 
The  Atonement — To  whom  it  appeals — The  Sargasso  Sea  of  the  Church 
— The  Broad  Churchman  has  no  message — To  the  sick  and  suffering — 
Sterility  of  the  party — In  the  mission  field — Among  the  poor — Necessity 
for  a  Creed — The  Evangelische  Kirche  of  Germany — Tubingen — Vagueness 
popular — Religion  in  the  back-seat — Arnold — Maurice — Stanley — Confes- 
sions of  a  Clergyman — Prayer — Object  of  the  Broad  Church — Tarpeia — ■ 
Rejection  of  Christian  morality — Compromise  with  the  world — Two  con- 
ceptions of  what  a  National  Church  should  be — The  elimination  of 
whatever  offends — With  what  result — Credo   .        .        .    pp.  368-390 


CHAPTER  XVII 
VIA  MEDIA 

Cessation  of  party  bitterness — Levelling  up — Frog  barometers — The 
ladder  system  in  the  Church — Its  advantages — Disadvantages  where  it 
does  not  exist — Indefiniteness — And  coldness — Long  and  short  sight  in 
matters  of  faith — Heresy  the  exaggeration  of  single  truths — Mistake  of 
having  but  one  type  of  service — In  watering-places — In  Continental  chapels 
— In  village  churches — Incapacity  in  some  to  digest  full  doctrine — Ladder 
system  in  conformity  with  nature — Evolution — The  unchurching  of 
foreign  Protestants — The  via  media  as  conceived  by  Dr.  Newman — Did 
not  apply  to  the  English  Reformation  as  a  position  deliberately  taken  up — 
The  actual  position  of  the  English  Church — Its  Liturgy  closely  resembles 
the  Sarum  Offices — The  via-media  man — The  working  man's  dislike  of  via 
media — But  it  suits  the  cultured  classes — Congregational  singing — Most 
English  clergy  via  media — Two  kinds  of  via-media  men — Advantage  of 
having  moderate  men  in  the  Church — Men  of  one  idea — The  moderate  man 
in  general  request  ........    pp.  391-407 


INDEX 


pp.  409-415 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 


The  Author   Frontispiece 

FACING  PAGE 

A  Backwater  *4 
In  the  Stream 

Jacobean  Screen,  Croscombe    56 

(From  a  photograph  by  J.  W.  Phillips,  Wells.) 

Dr.  Syntax  Preaching    .        .        .        .        .        .  .112 

(From  a  drawing  by  Rowlandson.) 

Confirmation  in  the  Forties  13° 

(From  Deformation  and  Reformation,  by  permission  of  Mowbray  &  Co.,  Oxford.) 

Irving  Preaching  146 

(From  Bilder  aus  London.) 

False  Keys    .........  168 

(From  The  Hornet,  1877.) 

Archbishop  Thomson      .       .       .       .       .       .  .182 

(From  Vanity  Fair.) 

Bishop  Tait  and  the  "  Black  Sheep  99   .       .       .       .  19° 

(From  Punch,  1874.) 

Sackville  College  Chapel  as  it  was  in  1847.       .       .  224 

(From  a  photograph  by  F.  Frith  &  Co.) 

At  the  Cattle  Show      .......  240 

(From  Punch,  1877.) 

The  Rev.  A.  Tooth  in  Prison  244 

(From  Vanity  Fair,  1877.) 

"  Sweetness   and   Light  :  "   Archbishops   Temple  and 

Maclagan         ........  262 

(From  the  Westminster  Gazette,  1899.) 

Dr.  Hook  and  the  Hornets  276 

(From  a  sketch  by  a  Curate,  reproduced  from  Stephens's  Life  of  Hook.) 

xix 


xx  THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 

FACING  PAGE 

Dangerous  Flirtation,  or  Sam  and  the  Scarlet  Lady   .  298 

(From  Punch,  1858.) 

"  A  Wolf  in  Sheep's  Clothing  "  300 

(From  Punch,  1877.) 

Via  Media  ........  392 

(From  The  Hornet,  1874.) 


ERRATA 


2,  line  16.    For  S.  Paul's  read  Canterbury. 
5,        10  jrom  bottom.    For  ten  read  twenty. 
44>   >>    3)  7-    F°r  Rene  read  Rene. 
204,        19.    Delete  ,  and. 

326,  note  1.    For  Pullen  (F.  M.),  read  Puller  (F.  W.) 

327,  ,,    2.    For  Pullen  read  Puller. 

333,  line  9 from  bottom.    For  unintelligibly  read  unintelligently. 
344,  ,,    22.    For  1833  read  1883. 

352,  ,,    6-7  from  bottom.    For  thirty-seven  read  forty. 

366,   ,,    7 bottom.    For  Archiepiscoparum  read  Archiepiscop 

370,  end  of  note.    Add  See  C.Q.R.  xvii.  313. 

370,  line  10.    For  Bethoron  read  Bethhoron. 

400,  second  column  at  bottom.    Omit  and  Dismissal. 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


CHAPTER  I 
THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH 
1547— 1660 

A SURVEY,  as  brief  as  I  can  make  it,  of  the  history  of  the 
Church  in  England  from  the  death  of  King  Henry  VIII 
must  be  allowed,  if  I  am  to  convey  to  the  reader  a  clear 
notion  of  the  diverse  elements  that  existed  in  her,  and 
explain  the  rise  of  the  Evangelical  and  the  Oxford  movements. 

In  limestone  districts  streams  often  sink  and  disappear,  but 
at  a  distance  of  some  miles  re-emerge  into  light,  with  increased 
volume.  It  is  important  to  trace  up  the  diverse  currents  of 
religious  convictions  to  their  sources,  that  for  a  period  have 
been  below  the  surface  invisible  and  unsuspected. 

The  exactions  of  the  Papacy  had  provoked  widespread 
hostility  towards  Rome,  and  the  English  people  were  quite 
content  to  be  rid  of  the  papal  yoke,  but  had  no  wish  to  shed 
the  Catholic  Faith  and  see  the  worship  of  the  Church  revolu- 
tionized. The  First  Prayer  Book  of  Edward  VI  issued  in  1549 
expressed  the  mind  of  the  English  Church;  such  reactionaries 
as  Tunstall  and  Gardiner  used  it  without  scruple.  All  the 
Bishops  signed  it,  with  one  exception.  But  under  the  sickly 
young  king,  the  reins  of  government  were  grasped  by  the 
Protector  Somerset,  and  after  his  execution,  by  Northumber- 
land ;  and  both  these  unprincipled  men  were  abetted  by  an 
equally  unprincipled  Council,  from  which  all  men  of  Conservative 
tendencies  had  been  excluded.  These  men  had  a  mind  to  enrich 
themselves  by  the  plunder  of  the  Church,  by  appropriating  to 
themselves  episcopal  manors,  the  estates  of  colleges,  hospitals 
and  chantries,  and  the  glebe  of  parsonages  ;   as  Henry  had 


2 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


despoiled  the  monasteries,  so  would  they  despoil  the  Church. 
For  effecting  this  purpose  no  better  expedient  presented  itself 
to  their  minds  than  the  Protestantizing  of  the  Church,  so  as  to 
render  her  powerless  to  resist. 

Accordingly  refugee  Reformers  from  the  Continent  were  wel- 
comed with  open  arms,  and  in  order  to  poison  the  wells,  Peter 
Martyr,  an  Italian,  who  came  by  way  of  Zurich  and  Strassburg, 
and  who  had  infected  the  mind  of  Ridley,  was  appointed  Regius 
Professor  of  Divinity  at  Oxford  in  May  1549  \  and  Martin 
Bucer,  a  Strassburg  pastor,  was  planted  in  the  professorial  chair 
of  Divinity  at  Cambridge  in  the  same  year.  Valerand  Pullain, 
a  Calvinistic  Fleming,  came  with  his  congregation  of  weavers 
to  England  and  was  settled  at  Glastonbury.  Pullain  published 
a  Calvinistic  form  of  worship  in  Latin,  in  1551,  and  dedicated 
it  to  Edward  VI  as  a  model  upon  which  the  English  Prayer  Book 
might  be  reshaped.  Ochino  was  made  prebendary  of  S.  Paul's. 
John  Knox  also  had  a  finger  in  the  pie.  It  is  due  to  a  violent 
sermon  of  his  against  kneeling  at  Communion,  that  the  "  Black 
Rubric  "  was  inserted  in  the  Prayer  Book. 

John  Alasco,  an  apostate  Bishop,  uncle  of  the  King  of  Poland, 
came  to  England  and  established  Calvinistic  worship  in  the 
nave  of  the  church  of  the  Austin  Friars.  He  also  was  con- 
sulted, so  was  Bullinger  of  Zurich,  as  to  how  far  on  the  downward 
path  it  was  advisable  for  the  English  divines  to  descend. 
"  Never,"  says  Dr.  Gairdner,  "  was  greater  deference  paid  to 
foreign  opinion  than  now,  in  a  Church  which  had  been  emanci- 
pated from  the  jurisdiction  of  a  foreign  bishop."  1 

Some  vivisectionists  have  extracted  the  brain  from  living 
animals,  so  as  to  ascertain  to  what  extent  they  can  live  and  move 
when  divested  of  this  vital  organ.  It  was  the  purpose  of  North- 
umberland and  the  Council  to  have  the  Church  so  treated,  all 
Catholicity  taken  out  of  her ;  and  for  this  purpose  Cranmer, 
Holgate  and  others  were  set  to  revise  the  Prayer  Book.  As 
Renan,  after  he  had  lost  faith,  still  retained  a  love  for  Chris- 
tianity, so  did  Cranmer.  However  harshly  his  foreign  counsellors 
might  bray  into  his  ears  their  advice  all  day,  at  night  came 
welling  up  the  music  of  the  ancient  liturgy  in  his  soul,  and  he 
could  not  resolve  to  cast  aside  so  much  that  was  beautiful  to 
please  his  masters,  the  Council,  and  his  foreign  friends. 

There  can  exist  no  doubt  that  the  numerical  preponderance 

1  Gairdner  (Jas.),  The  English  Church  in  the  Sixteenth  Century  (1902), 
p.  291. 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  3 


of  the  population  was  as  many  to  one  in  favour  of  the  old 
religion.  The  advanced  reformers  comprised  but  a  very  few 
inhabitants  in  any  place,  town  or  country.  Such  as  did  exist 
owed  their  views  to  Tyndale's  Bible.  Tyndale  had  been  living 
at  Worms.  He  fell  under  the  influence  of  the  Swiss  reformers, 
whose  convert  he  became.  He  translated  the  New  Testament 
into  English,  giving  it  a  strong  Zwinglian  bias,  and  he  prefixed 
to  every  part,  as  issued,  a  preface  vehemently  denunciatory  of 
the  Catholic  system  of  orders  and  sacraments.  The  book  was 
smuggled  into  England  in  the  reign  of  Henry  VIII,  and  dissemi- 
nated among  such  as  could  read,  doctrines  "  made  in  Switzerland/' 

However,  in  1547  the  Commentary  of  Erasmus  in  English  was 
ordered  to  be  provided  for  every  parish  church,  so  that  the 
readers  of  the  Great  Bible  might  at  the  same  time  receive  a 
sober  and  orthodox  interpretation  of  the  Sacred  Text. 

In  the  same  year  the  First  Book  of  the  Homilies  was  issued, 
and  prefaced  by  a  letter  from  the  King  enjoining  these  homilies 
to  be  read  in  all  churches  every  Sunday,  by  such  priests  as 
could  not  preach.  "  But  it  is  strange,"  observes  Strype,  "  to 
consider  how  anything,  be  it  never  so  beneficial  and  innocent, 
oftentimes  gives  offence.  For  a  great  many,  both  of  the  laity 
as  well  as  the  clergy,  could  not  digest  these  homilies  ;  and 
therefore,  sometimes,  when  they  were  read  in  church,  if  the 
parishioners  liked  them  not,  there  would  be  such  talking  and 
babbling  in  the  church  that  nothing  could  be  heard."  Many 
parishes  refused  to  provide  the  bread  and  wine  for  the  Holy 
Communion  under  the  new  rite. 

The  English  Prayer  Book  was  unpopular;  that,  combined 
with  the  enclosure  of  commons  and  the  depreciation  of  the 
standard,  caused  risings  of  the  people  in  Devon,  Cornwall,  Essex, 
Oxfordshire,  Kent,  Suffolk  and  Norfolk.1  The  condition  of  affairs 
was  serious,  and  had  there  been  combined  action  among  the 
insurgents  the  Government  would  have  fallen.  Martial  law  was 
established  in  London,  and  the  insurrections  were  put  down  by 
thousands  of  Flemish  and  German  lanzknechts,  and  Spanish 
arquebusmen,  sent  by  the  Council  through  the  country  to  butcher 
the  unhappy  peasants.  The  diaries  of  the  period  are  full  of 
records  of  executions. 

1  "  Insurrections  broke  out  in  Hertfordshire,  Somerset,  and  Lincoln- 
shire ;  then  in  Devonshire  and  Cornwall  ;  in  Gloucestershire,  Berkshire 
and  Buckinghamshire,  Nottinghamshire,  Warwickshire,  Northamptonshire; 
in  Norfolk,  Suffolk,  Essex,  and  Kent  ;  and  also  far  away  in  Yorkshire."  — 
Gairdner  (J.),  The  English  Church  in  the  Sixteenth  Century,  p.  266. 


4 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


In  the  last  Parliament  of  Edward  VI  no  members  were  returned 
for  the  counties  that  were  dissatisfied  with  the  change  in  re- 
ligion. The  Council  found  it  necessary  to  forbid  all  parochial 
clergy,  and  even  the  bishops,  to  preach  without  being  accorded 
a  licence  by  the  Government,  and  special  preachers  were  dis- 
patched by  the  Council  through  the  land  to  instil  the  new  doc* 
trines  into  the  people.  These  men  met  with  little  encourage- 
ment, for  often  the  use  of  the  pulpits  in  the  parish  churches  was 
refused  them  by  the  parsons  and  churchwardens.  Moreover,  a 
strict  censorship  was  exercised  over  the  press,  and  nothing  was 
suffered  to  be  published  in  favour  of  the  old  religion,  whereas 
liberty  most  free  was  accorded  to  scurrilous  and  indecent 
pamphlets  attacking  Episcopacy,  the  Real  Presence  and  the 
efficacy  of  Baptism,  and  advocating  the  grossest  antinomianism. 
"  The  Church,"  wrote  Canon  Dixon,  "  was  held  dumb  through- 
out this  period,  by  the  positive  orders  of  the  Council." 

The  Reformation  under  Edward  VI  was  carried  through 
without  consulting  Convocation,  by  the  Protector  and  the 
Council  at  the  head  of  a  small  and  detested  minority  in  both 
Church  and  Nation.  "  The  Convocation  of  the  Clergy  had 
nothing  to  do  with  the  First  Act  for  the  Uniformity  of  Religion. 
.  .  .  Neither  the  First  Act  for  Uniformity,  nor  any  of  the  acts 
that  came  thereafter  had  any  such  origin.  Laymen  were  the 
authors  of  these  momentous  measures.  Laymen  made  the  First 
English  Prayer  Book  into  the  schedule  of  a  penal  statute,  and 
from  the  time  that  they  first  did  so,  with  mournful  consistency, 
a  penal  statute  accompanied  every  succeeding  revision  of  the 
Book  of  Common  Prayer.  As  little  in  the  work  itself,  which 
was  thus  imposed  on  the  realm,  had  the  clergy  originally  any 
share."  1 

Antonio  de  Guarras,  a  Spanish  merchant  living  in  London, 
and  speaking  English  perfectly,  wrote  his  account  of  the  acces- 
sion of  Queen  Mary ;  in  this  he  says  that  there  were  but  4  per  cent 
in  the  country  who  were  infected  with  the  new  religion  ;  and 
he  judged  from  London,  where  it  had  made  far  more  way  than 
in  the  country. 

I  have  already  mentioned  some  of  the  foreign  Reformers  who 
came  to  England.  Cranmer  had  surrounded  himself  in  Lambeth 
Palace  with  a  crowd  of  these  men.  Beside  Peter  Martyr  there 
were  Julius,  Tremellius,  Dryander  and  other  French  Calvinists 
pouring  their  insidious  advice  into  his  too  open  ears.  Others  were 
1  Dixon,  History  of  the  English  Church,  iii.  5. 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH 


5 


Peter  Alexander,  Bernadino  Ochino,  who  was  made  prebendary 
of  Canterbury,  Matthew  Nigellinus,  and  Martin  Mycronius.  In 
the  second  year  of  Edward  came  Fagius,  destined  with  Bucer  to 
occupy  one  of  the  professorial  chairs  at  Cambridge.  Cranmer 
entreated  Melancthon  thrice  to  come  to  England  and  help  in  the 
revision  of  the  Prayer  Book,  along  with  Alasco,  who  did  come. 
Calvin  also  thought  fit  to  intermeddle.  He  wrote  to  the  Protector 
on  October  22,  1548,  tendering  his  advice,  or  rather  his  dictation. 
Dryander,  a  Lutheran,  was  placed  by  Cranmer  at  Cambridge. 
Christopher  Mount  was  dispatched  by  the  Archbishop  with  a 
circular  letter  to  Zurich,  written  in  the  name  of  the  young  King, 
in  which  the  religious  agreement  between  England  and  Zurich 
was  assumed.  It  suggested  that  a  Council  should  be  held  for  the 
settlement  of  religion  on  a  common  basis.  Happily  nothing 
came  of  it.  Again  Calvin  thought  fit  to  interfere,  by  writing  to 
the  King  in  155 1,  and  to  Cranmer,  exhorting  them  to  get  rid  of 
every  trace  of  superstition.  The  objections  raised  by  these 
foreigners  to  the  First  Prayer  Book,  the  urgency  of  the  Council 
and  the  "  down-grade  "  tendency  of  Cranmer's  mind,  determined 
the  latter  on  a  reformation  of  the  Prayer  Book.  He  associated 
with  himself  the  adulterous  Holgate,  Archbishop  of  York,1  and 
the  Bishops  of  London  and  Ely ;  and,  acting  on  the  advice  of 
Peter  Martyr  and  Martin  Bucer — but  not  implicitly — he  produced 
the  Second  Book  in  1552.  Bucer  had  recommended  the  pulling 
down  of  all  chancels.  But  this  was  not  done,  as  "  there  was 
no  money  in  it,"  and  it  would  have  entailed  expense  in  walling 
up  the  chancel  arches.  Somerset  had  desired  to  pull  down 
Westminster  Abbey  and  use  the  materials  for  building  a  palace 
for  himself,  and  was  only  bought  off  by  the  Dean  and  Chapter 
by  the  surrender  of  ten  manors.  Then,  for  the  construction  of 
Somerset  House  he  destroyed  S.  Mary-le-Strand  and  the  cloister 
of  S.  Paul's  Cathedral. 

Too  much  credit  has  been  accorded  to  Cranmer  for  moderation 
in  the  drawing  up  of  the  Second  Prayer  Book  of  1552:  that 
he  and  the  other  divines  were  Zwinglians  with  a  strong  dash  of 
Calvinism,  is  certain,  and  that  they  desired  to  revolutionize 
the  faith  and  worship  of  the  Church  is  pretty  certain.  The 
Council  desired  it  eagerly,  and  was  not  slow  to  mark  its  contempt 
for  the  book  as  not  going  far  enough.    But  there  was  a  force 

1  Poynet,  Bishop  of  Rochester  and  then  of  Winchester,  got  into  a 
scrape  by  adultery  with  a  butcher's  wife  at  Nottingham.  Cranmer  does 
not  appear  to  have  thought  anything  of  that. 


6 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


beside  the  Council  that  had  to  be  reckoned  with,  and  that  was 
the  English  people,  who  disliked  the  changes.  In  fact,  the  risings 
in  so  many  counties  against  the  First  Prayer  Book,  with  the 
consequent  bloodshed,  and  the  gallows  set  up  beside  all  highways, 
taught  Cranmer  caution,  and  he  was  afraid  of  giving  occasion 
for  further  revolts  by  too  drastic  an  alteration. 

The  new,  the  second  Prayer  Book  of  Edward  VI,  was  issued 
without  having  been  submitted  to  Convocation,  on  January  10, 
1552.  Happily  for  England  and  her  Church,  Edward  died  on 
July  6,  1553,  so  that  the  new  Prayer  Book,  every  page  of  which 
was  soiled  by  the  finger-marks  of  Bucer,1  Peter  Martyr,  Pullain 
and  Bullinger,  had  but  a  brief  existence.  All  England  welcomed 
Mary.  It  had  been  heartily  disgusted  with  the  self-seeking  and 
the  rapacity  of  the  Council,  with  the  sacrilege  and  devastation 
of  the  churches,  and  with  the  violent  changes  in  religion.  Indeed, 
as  Paget  wrote  to  Protector  Somerset  :  eleven -twelfths  of  the 
kingdom  were  opposed  to  the  new-fangled  teaching.2 

Mary  was  received  in  London  and  acclaimed  throughout  the 
country  with  transports  of  joy.  Most  of  the  Reformers  fled  to  the 
Continent,  without  any  attempt  being  made  to  detain  them. 
When  Mary  came  to  the  throne,  she  declared  in  Council,  on 
August  12,  that  "  she  meant  not  to  compel  or  strain  the  con- 
science of  others,  otherwise  than  by  persuasion  ; "  and  such  as 
had  got  to  like  the  English  service  were  at  ease.  At  her  accession 
the  heart  of  the  people  was  Catholic,  but  by  no  means  Roman  ; 
when  Elizabeth  succeeded,  it  was  Protestant.  There  is  good 
cause  to  hold  that  the  actual  conversion  to  Reforming  opinions 
went  on  at  a  speedier  rate  amidst  the  fires  of  Smithfield  than 
during  the  oppressive  rule  of  Somerset  and  Northumberland.  In 
1554  Mary  issued  orders  for  Mass  to  be  performed  in  Latin,  and 
for  the  ejection  from  their  cures  of  all  married  clergy.  Such 
as  consented  to  renounce  their  wives  were  to  be  dealt  with 
leniently,  and  be  transferred  to  other  cures,  unless  they  had 
previously  belonged  to  one  or  other  of  the  Religious  Orders. 
The  number  thus  deprived  was  about  one  in  six.3 

1  Bucer  gives  us  his  experience  as  to  the  result  of  his  teaching  in  Strass- 
burg.  He  candidly  admitted  :  "  What  have  we  done  to  the  great  edifice 
of  Christianity  ?  We  have  destroyed  a  great  deal,  but  we  have  built  up 
nothing.  We  have  rejected  a  great  deal,  and  our  successors  go  on  and 
reject  more — the  commandments  of  God  and  common  morality."  And 
this  was  the  man  invited  to  work  the  same  mischief  in  England  !  On 
further  admissions  of  Bucer  of  wretched  results,  see  Dollinger,  Die  Re- 
formation, ii.  21  et  seq. 

2  Strype,  ii.  110. 

3  Frere,  The  Marian  Reaction  (S.P.C.K.,  1896),  p.  77. 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  7 


In  the  diocese  of  Canterbury  73  were  expelled,  but  of  these 
4  were  reinstated.  In  the  diocese  of  Lichfield,  out  of  550  bene- 
fices, the  number  of  clergy  dispossessed  was  43,  or  one  in  12. 
In  Bath  and  Wells,  where  the  preferments  were  390,  69  incum- 
bents were  deprived  or  resigned — about  1  in  5.  In  Norwich,  out 
of  1,120  parishes,  335  were  destituted,  or  less  than  1  in  5.  In 
the  diocese  of  London  as  it  is  at  present  constituted  there  were 
213  parishes :  Mary  deprived  36  in  4J  years,  being  2  out  of  13. 
There  would  appear,  however,  throughout  England  to  have  been 
a  certain  number  of  benefices  to  which  laymen  had  been  in- 
truded under  the  lax  and  immoral  rule  of  Protector  Somerset 
and  the  Duke  of  Northumberland,  and  these  men  were  of  course 
ejected.  There  seems  to  have  been  little  or  no  question  as  to 
the  validity  of  Ordination  under  the  Reformed  Ordinal,  though 
in  the  first  six  months  after  Mary  ascended  the  throne  a  few 
clergy,  in  a  panic  lest  they  should  be  dispossessed,  sought  the 
making  up  of  any  deficiency  in  their  ordination  by  having  their 
hands  anointed.  "  Reasons  have  already  been  given  to  show 
that  the  general  cause  of  deprivation  was  marriage,  and  in  the 
cases  where  no  cause  is  assigned  it  is  natural  to  suppose  that 
it  was  this.  At  any  rate,  there  is  no  shadow  of  a  hint  that 
invalidity  of  orders  had  anything  to  do  with  it."  1 

It  was  moreover  taken  for  granted  that  all  these  clergy  were 
orthodox  and  not  infected  with  the  new  doctrines,  and  further 
knew  how  to  celebrate  in  Catholic  manner  at  the  altars. 

When  the  news  reached  the  Continent  that  Mary  was  dead 
all  the  Reformers,  who  during  her  reign  had  wrangled  and 
denounced  one  another,  came  back  to  England,  with  a  horde  of 
foreigners  at  their  backs. 

When  these  men  arrived  in  England,  they  laboured  inde- 
fatigably  to  spread  their  imported  opinions  and  to  capture 
the  Church.  They  did  not  succeed  in  this  latter  attempt,  but 
they  spread  through  the  land,  influencing  men's  minds  every- 
where against  all  that  savoured  of  Catholic  antiquity. 

They  found  to  their  dissatisfaction  that  the  second  Prayer 
Book  of  Edward  VI  had  been  already  subjected  to  revision 
and  had  been  reinforced  in  a  Catholic  direction,  and  that  there 
was  manifested  by  the  Queen  no  intention  of  lowering  the  tone. 

In  or  about  1567  a  veritable  inundation  of  foreign  malcontents 
came  to  London,  so  extensive  as  to  move  the  jealousy  of  the 
community.  The  rent  of  houses  was  raised  ;  these  strangers 
1  Frere,  The  Marian  Reaction  (S.P.C.K.,  1896),  p.  109. 


8 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


interfered  with  the  trade.  The  streets  had  to  be  patrolled  by 
the  watch  to  prevent  an  outbreak  of  the  'prentices  against  them. 
The  ports  and  havens  were  crowded  by  them.  They  founded 
colonies  everywhere.  The  Bishops  of  London,  Winchester  and 
Lincoln  greatly  favoured  them,  as  introducing  a  further  in- 
fusion of  heresy  to  strengthen  the  amount  already  found  in  the 
land,  and  with  which  these  prelates  were  in  sympathy.  They 
were  hardly  settled  in  England  before  they  were  torn  into  factions 
fighting  one  another  over  theological  points  of  no  profit  either 
spiritually  or  morally. 

The  restoration  of  the  Prayer  Book  with  its  alterations  at 
once  called  forth  their  animadversions.  Peter  Martyr  and 
Bullinger  wrote  giving  the  perfidious  advice  to  the  Puritan 
clergy  who  had  returned,  that  they  should  conform  in  part  only 
to  the  liturgy,  but  preach  against  the  ceremonies  still  retained, 
and  refrain  from  administering  the  Sacraments  so  long  as  the 
vestments  were  in  use.  Beza  also,  from  Geneva,  put  in  his 
word  in  1577,  writing  to  advise  that  nothing  should  be  allowed 
in  the  matter  of  ceremonies  but  what  was  after  "  Christ's  ordin- 
ance, and  the  assured  example  of  the  Apostles." 

The  Zurich  letters  show  us  that  the  Bishops  under  Elizabeth 
were  appealing  incessantly  for  advice  to  the  foreigners.  In 
1565-6,  Home,  Parkhurst  and  Grindal  sought  to  justify  them- 
selves to  Bullinger  and  Gualter  for  having  accepted  bishoprics 
with  the  obligation  to  wear  habits  and  use  ceremonies  to  which 
these  foreigners  objected.  Can  anything  be  conceived  more 
humiliating  ?  They  wrote  their  apologies  also,  in  conjunction 
with  Coverdale,  to  Beza,  Farel  and  Vinetus  at  Geneva  :  "  An 
unleavened  cake  instead  of  common  bread  ;  the  Communion 
taken  on  bended  knees  ;  a  square  cap,  bands,  gown  and  tippet 
out  of  doors  ;  the  surplice  and  cope  in  divine  worship,  such  is 
the  picture  of  the  Church  !  They  who  refuse  it  are  deprived. 
.  .  .  Publish  a  treatise  to  instruct  both  our  Church  and  the 
Saxon  Churches.  Admonish  our  bishops  by  a  printed  letter  not 
to  persecute  Joseph  for  his  coat  .  .  .  communicate  this  letter  to 
all  your  brethren."  1  Nor  did  Knox  and  the  Edinburgh  assembly 
abstain  from  uncalled-for — not  to  say  impertinent  interference, 
by  sending  a  letter  "  to  the  Bishops  and  Pastors  of  England," 
deprecating  the  "  Roman  rags  and  dregs  of  the  Roman  Beast  " 
still  found  in  the  Church  (December  27,  1566). 

Beza  wrote  to  Grindal  advising  that  the  English  Church 
1  Zurich  Letters,  ii.  121. 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH 


9 


should  combine  with  the  Scottish  Kirk  in  accepting  the  Helvetian 

Confession,  approved  by  the  Geneva  Community. 
The  four  demands  of  the  Puritans  were  these  : 
(i)  Equality  of  all  ministers.    The  title  and  office  of  Bishop 

to  be  allowed  to  remain,  but  only  as  synonymous  with  Pastor 

or  Teacher. 

•  (2)  All  members  of  the  Church  to  be  subject  to  the  discipline 
of  the  Consistory. 

(3)  The  break  with  the  past,  with  the  historic  Church,  to  be 
made  absolute.  The  clergy  who  had  been  ordained  under 
Henry  VIII  and  Mary  to  be  ejected  from  their  cures,  and  every- 
thing in  the  Communion  service  that  recalled  the  Mass  to  be  cast 
forth. 

(4)  Nothing  to  be  tolerated  in  public  worship  that  had  not 
been  expressly  enjoined  by  Scripture.1 

Elizabeth  had  a  very  difficult  part  to  play.  It  was  her  idea, 
as  well  as  that  of  her  advisers,  that  the  Church  should  be  National 
and  all-comprehensive.  It  must  contain  those  who  clung  to 
Catholic  order  and  tradition,  but  those  also  who  had  been  infected 
with  the  tenets  of  the  foreign  Reformers.  Accordingly,  at  the 
revision  of  the  Articles  of  Religion  under  Elizabeth  the  articles 
dealing  with  doctrines  about  which  was  dispute,  as  those  on 
Justification  by  Faith  and  Predestination,  were  couched  in  such 
terms  as  seemed  to  favour  the  opinions  of  the  Reformers,  but 
qualifications  were  added  that  somewhat  neutralised  their  force. 
Articles  xi,  xii,  and  xvi  were  cast  to  these  fanatics  to  mumble,2 
whilst  the  faithful  were  given  their  Liturgy  and  rites  to  satisfy 
their  conservative  instincts. 

Certain  Articles  of  Religion  were,  in  point  of  fact,  much  like 
Caliban  with  Trinculo  under  his  gaberdine,  having  a  forward 
and  a  backward  voice,  at  one  and  the  same  time. 

At  the  outset  of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  the  clergy  as  a  body 
objected  to  any  change  in  the  services  of  the  Church  and  any 
tampering  with  the  Faith.  This  was  shown  by  the  protest  of 
Convocation  in  1559,  and  by  the  resolute  opposition  maintained 
by  the  Bishops  in  Parliament.    The  Supremacy  and  Uniformity 

1  Paget  (Dean),  An  Introduction  to  the  Fifth  Book  of  Hooker's  Treatise 
on  the  Laws  of  Ecclesiastical  Polity  (Oxford,  1899),  pp.  52-3. 

2  The  Convocation  of  1573  which  recast  the  Articles  framed  this  Canon 
for  their  interpretation  by  all  preachers  :  "In  the  first  place  they  shall 
provide  that  they  never  teach  aught  .  .  .  which  they  desire  to  be  devoutly 
held  and  believed  by  the  people  save  that  which  is  agreeable  to  the  doctrine 
of  the  Old  and  New  Testament  and  which  the  Catholic  Fathers  and  ancient 
Bishops  have  gathered  from  the  said  doctrine." 


10 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Acts  and  the  revived  and  amended  Edwardine  Injunctions  were  in 
force  by  Midsummer  1559.  A  Royal  Commission  was  appointed 
to  visit  both  provinces  and  to  impose  on  all  the  clergy  an  oath  to 
accept  the  Supremacy  of  the  Crown,  to  use  the  Prayer  Book  alone 
in  public  ministration,  and  to  observe  the  Injunctions.  The 
Visitors  were  empowered  to  deprive  of  their  benefices  such  clergy 
as  refused  the  oath. 

This  oath  was  administered  throughout  the  country  during 
August,  September  and  October,  1559.  A  large  number  of  clergy 
in  the  North  put  in  no  appearance.  We  have  a  complete  list 
of  them  in  the  North,  and  a  list  of  those  who  took  the  oath 
survives  for  five  dioceses  in  the  South.  These  show  that  nearly 
half  the  clergy  absented  themselves  from  the  Visitation.  Such 
as  did  appear  and  took  the  oath  were  mainly  Henrician  or 
Marian  appointments  who  submitted  to  the  change. 

At  the  time  of  the  Visitation  of  the  Diocese  of  York  there 
were  35  livings  vacant.  The  absentees  from  it,  of  men  who 
could  not  make  up  their  minds  to  take  the  oath,  numbered  152. 
Of  these  only  5  were  deprived  ;  the  others  succeeded  in  swallowing 
their  scruples. 

In  the  diocese  of  Durham  there  were  180  incumbents,  and 
of  these  35  absented  themselves  from  the  Visitation,  but  of 
these  35  only  3  were  deprived. 

In  the  diocese  of  Carlisle  there  were  100  clergy,  35  absented 
themselves,  and  of  these  2  were  deprived. 

In  the  diocese  of  Chester  there  were  250  incumbents,  90  ab- 
sented themselves,  yet  not  one  was  deprived. 

There  were,  however,  in  the  whole  Northern  province  22  men 
who  had  been  ejected  from  their  livings  under  Queen  Mary, 
and  these  were  now  reinstated. 

Those  who  evaded  subscription  at  the  Visitation  either  in 
the  next  few  months  took  the  oath  or  were  passed  over.  No 
great  diligence  was  used  to  enforce  subscription.  Nicholas 
Sanders  in  1571  drew  up  a  list  of  those  clergy  who  had  refused 
subscription  and  were  ousted  from  their  cures.  He  made  the 
number  to  be  480  ;  but  his  list  of  names  has  been  minutely 
investigated  by  Dr.  Henry  Gee  by  the  aid  of  the  Registers,  and 
he  shows  that  Sanders  included  laymen,  and  that  a  goodly  number 
of  those  he  gives  as  ejected  cannot  be  traced  at  all  in  any  register. 

The  ascertainable  number  of  clergy  deprived  for  all  causes 
between  November  17,  1558,  and  November  17,  1564,  is  about 
400 ;  but  then  in  the  later  period  the  deprivations  were  of  Puritans 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  11 


who  refused  to  make  use  of  the  Prayer  Book  in  their  public 
ministrations ;  and  Dr.  Gee  says  that  on  a  review  of  the  whole 
evidence  it  is  impossible  to  conclude  that  many  more  than  200 
Papist  clergy  were  deprived  within  the  period  1558-64,  because 
they  would  not  conform  to  the  Prayer  Book  and  accept  the 
Royal  Supremacy.1 

Camden  says  that  out  of  9,400  parishes  only  189  priests  refused 
to  conform  to  the  English  Liturgy,  but  of  these  were  50  Preben- 
daries, 15  Presidents  of  Colleges,  12  Archdeacons,  12  Deans, 
6  Abbots  and  14  Bishops,  of  parish  priests  only  80.  According 
to  Collier,  the  total  number  was  229,  that  would  give  120  parish 
priests. 

Now  what  do  we  gather  from  this,  but  the  fact  that  the  vast 
majority  of  the  beneficed  clergy  who  had  sung  Mass  during  the 
reign  of  Queen  Mary  in  Latin,  wearing  the  Eucharistic  vestments 
continued  during  the  reign  of  Queen  Elizabeth,  singing  Mass  in 
English,  perhaps  to  the  setting  of  Merbecke,  more  probably  to 
the  old  inflections  to  which  they  were  accustomed,  accommodating 
thereto  the  English  words  as  best  they  might — just  as  I  have 
heard  done  in  Germany  among  the  Old  Catholics,  just  as  is  done 
still  in  Iceland,  where  the  melody  is  that  of  the  Pre- Reformation 
missal,  but  the  words  are  in  the  vernacular. 

So  also  these  priests  throughout  the  length  and  breadth  of 
the  land  would  use  the  vestments,  lights,  ceremonial  to  which 
they  had  been  accustomed,  where  no  rubric  directed  to  the 
contrary. 

An  instance  of  the  manner  in  which  changes  were  accepted 
without  much  difficulty  is  to  be  found  in  the  fortunes  of  S.  John's 
College,  Oxford,  that  had  Sir  Thomas  White  as  its  founder  in 
the  reign  of  Queen  Mary.  He  accepted  the  English  Prayer 
Book,  and  provided  for  the  performance  of  Divine  service  in 
the  college  chapel,  with  no  sign  of  violent  breach  with  the  past.8 

How  great  and  how  piteous  the  confusion  was  in  the  English 
Church  may  be  gathered  from  a  letter  of  Mendoza  to  the  king  of 
Spain,  in  1567.  He  wrote  that  it  would  be  a  difficult  matter  to 
reduce  to  one  form  in  England  the  diversity  of  belief  and  teaching 

1  Gee  (Dr.),  The  Elizabethan  Clergy  and  the  Settlement  of  Religion,  1558- 
1564  (Oxford,  1898).  This  admirable  work  gives  the  names  of  all  who 
were  deprived,  and  approximately  all  the  Marian  clergy  who  conformed. 

2  There  still  remain  in  the  vestry  of  S.  John's  College  two  tunicles  and 
a  white  cope  of  the  same  set,  the  orphreys  of  two  chasubles,  cut  out  of 
the  vestments  probably  late  in  the  seventeenth  century,  and  a  magnificent 
cope  of  blue  and  gold. 


12 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


that  existed  therein,  for  "  in  every  parish  church  a  different 
service  is  held  according  to  the  bent  of  the  minister ;  "  and 
this  is  confirmed  by  an  account  published  somewhat  later,  by 
J.  Howlet,  at  Douay,  wherein  he  says  :  "  Although  the  world 
knoweth  that  the  Order  set  down  in  the  book  [of  Common  Prayer] 
be  commonly  broken  by  every  minister  at  his  pleasure,  and 
observed  almost  nowhere,  yet  small  punishment  hath  ever 
ensued  thereof."  Robert  Parsons,  in  a  pamphlet  published  in 
1580  against  the  Roman  Catholics  attending  the  reformed  ser- 
vices in  their  parish  churches,  says  of  the  clergy  that  "  They 
deall  too  chyldishilye,  when  they  say,  their  service  differeth  in 
nothing  from  the  ould  Catholicke  service,  but  onelye  because 
it  is  in  English  :  thereby  thinking  to  make  the  simple  people  to 
have  the  lesse  scruple  to  come  to  it."  This  must  have  been 
where  the  English  Liturgy  was  sung  with  much  of  the  old  cere- 
monial, with  lights  and  vestments,  and  where  the  Holy  Table 
stood  altarwise,  as  it  did  everywhere  except  where  the  new 
hot- Gospellers  held  sway. 

Bucer  long  before,  in  November  1550,  writing  to  Hooper, 
complained  :  "In  many  places  the  Lord's  Supper  so  takes  the 
place  of  the  Mass,  that  the  people  do  not  know  in  what  respect 
it  differs  from  it  except  that  it  is  celebrated  in  the  vulgar  tongue." 

Neal,  in  his  History  of  the  Puritans,  says  :  "  The  service  per- 
formed in  the  Queen's  chapel  and  in  sundry  cathedrals  was  so 
splendid  and  showy  that  foreigners  could  not  distinguish  it  from 
the  Roman,  except  that  it  was  performed  in  the  English  tongue. 
By  this  method  most  of  the  popish  laity  were  deceived  into  con- 
formity, and  came  regularly  to  church  for  nine  or  ten  years." 

But  a  change  ensued.  For  the  most  part  the  Elizabethan 
Bishops  were  an  unworthy  set,  avaricious,  unscrupulous,  and 
some  of  them  unlearned.  These  men  encouraged  and  advanced 
clergy  infected  with  Calvinism ;  and  Burleigh,  Sir  Christopher 
Hatton,  Lord  North,  Leicester,  Walsingham  throughout  favoured 
such  as  had  been  abroad  and  there  contracted  Zwinglian  and 
other  heresies ;  so  that  as  the  old  Marian  clergy  that  had  con- 
formed died,  into  their  places  were  thrust  either  directly  by  these 
noble  patrons,  or  mediately  through  the  Bishops,  men  who  had 
no  savour  of  Catholicity  about  them. 

We  read  and  hear  of  "  The  Elizabethan  settlement  "  as 
though  religion  in  her  reign  had  settled  into  something  like  the 
form  that  the  Church  afterwards  assumed.  But  the  condition 
under  Elizabeth  was  actually  one  of  unsettlement — of  the  clash- 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  13 


ing  of  jarring  and  irreconcilable  ideas,  "  a  time  of  sharp  con- 
fusion and  inconsistent  hopes."  The  men  whom  Leicester  and 
Walsingham  imported  into  the  Church  brought  their  foreign 
heresy  with  them  j  they  did  not  find  it  ingrained  therein.  It 
was  with  the  Anglican  Church,  not  what  would  be  scrofula  in  the 
human  system,  lodged  in  the  blood,  affecting  the  glands  and  all 
the  vital  organs,  but  as  a  superficial  disorder,  that  may  sadly 
disfigure  for  awhile,  but  can  be  subdued  by  judicious  treatment. 
It  was  an  episode  in  the  history  of  the  English  Church,  as  was 
Arianism  in  the  Universal  Church  fifteen  centuries  ago.  The 
Elizabethan  bishops,  men  returned  from  abroad,  had  left  their 
hearts  behind  at  Zurich.  They  had  no  belief  in  Episcopacy, 
and  would,  if  allowed,  have  swept  out  of  the  Church  all  marks  of 
Catholicity.  They  expressed  a  wish  to  get  rid  even  of  the  sur- 
plice, and  they  put  a  disingenuous  gloss  on  the  Ornaments  rubric, 
openly  proposed  the  abolition  of  the  Cross  in  baptism,  objected 
to  chanting  and  to  organs,  and  followed  Ridley's  practice  of 
turning  the  Holy  Table  lengthwise,1  so  that  the  priest  might 
stand  at  the  north  side,  facing  south,  a  quibbling  compliance 
with  the  rubric  of  1552,  defeating  the  real  purport. 

A  great  distinction  must  be  drawn  between  the  condition  of  the 
Church  in  the  reign  of  Edward  VI,  and  in  that  of  Elizabeth. 
In  the  former  period  the  Church  was  subjected  to  outrage  and 
profanation  by  the  rulers  of  the  State,  men  destitute  of  religion, 
lusting  after  spoliation,  who  would  carry  off  the  copes  to  make 
coverlets  for  their  beds,  and  chalices  to  decorate  their  side- 
boards. But  under  Elizabeth  the  fermentation  was  within. 
The  disciples  of  the  foreign  Reformers  were  ordained  priests, 
consecrated  Bishops  ;  and  it  was  they  who  set  zealously  to 
work  to  devastate  the  Houses  of  God  in  the  land,  and  render 
the  worship  of  God  indecorous.  Let  me  take  one  instance. 
Emmanuel  College,  Cambridge,  had  been  founded  by  Sir  Thomas 
Mildmay  to  become  a  nursery  of  Puritanism.  The  college  had 
been  a  Convent  of  Preaching  Friars.  Their  chapel  was  now 
converted  into  the  dining-hall,  and  a  fireplace  erected  where 
had  been  the  high  altar.  The  old  refectory,  pointing  north  and 
south,  was  made  into  the  chapel.  In  the  latter  no  surplices 
were  worn  at  any  service.  "  In  Emmanuel  College  they  receive 
the  Holy  Sacrament  sittinge  upon  formes  about  the  Communion 
table,  and  doe  pull  the  loafe  one  from  the  other  after  the  minister 
hath  begon.  And  soe  the  cupp,  one  drinking  as  it  were  to 
1  At  least  he  did  so  on  Easter  Eve,  1 551,  in  S.  Paul's  Cathedral. 


14 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


another  like  good  fellows,  without  any  particular  application 
of  the  said  words,  more  than  once  for  all." 

There  were  thus  in  the  Church  of  England  as  established,  two 
currents  flowing  between  the  same  banks,  of  diametrically 
opposite  colour.  It  is  so  during  a  certain  portion  of  the  course 
of  the  Danube:  one  stream  is  brown  and  charged  with  mud, 
the  other  issuing  from  the  great  source  of  Bleubeuren  is  limpid 
and  of  a  singularly  blue  and  heavenly  tinge  ;  after  these  streams 
have  united,  for  some  miles  they  can  be  discriminated,  flowing 
side  by  side  but  not  commingling. 

A  certain  impetus  had  been  given  to  the  Protestant  stream 
of  feeling,  through  the  hatred  of  Rome  and  Spain  provoked  by 
the  cruelties  of  Queen  Mary,  and  by  the  risks  the  country  ran 
through  the  machinations  of  the  partisans  of  Mary  Queen  of 
Scots,  and  the  menace  of  invasion  from  Spain  ;  but  the  English 
people  drew  a  long  breath  of  relief  when  the  Scottish  Queen  had 
been  executed,  1587,  and  the  Armada  wrecked,  1588.  Then 
came  the  turn  of  the  tide.  Elizabeth  perfectly  understood  the 
temper  and  mind  of  her  English  subjects.  She  knew  that  the 
vast  bulk  of  the  nation  was  sober-minded  and  conservative 
in  religion,  and  that  it  entertained  a  profound  distaste  for  the 
violence  and  extravagance  of  the  Puritans.  The  turn  of  the 
tide  was  marked  by  Bancroft's  epoch-making  sermon  at  S.  Paul's, 
on  February  9,  1589,  on  the  divine  institution  of  Episcopacy. 
Hitherto  the  orthodox  party  had  been  without  leaders. 
But  now  such  men  appeared.  Jewel  wrote  his  Apology;  and 
Richard  Hooker,  feeling  that  some  basis  must  be  found  for  the 
position  of  the  English  Church,  whilst  still  young — he  was  but 
thirty-eight  years  old — retired  from  the  strife  of  tongues  to 
consider  in  quietness  what  had  to  be  done,  and  then  to  do  it. 
It  is  rare,  as  Dean  Paget  wrote,  "  for  the  heat  of  controversy 
to  kindle  in  a  man  the  desire  not  to  talk  but  to  think."  Jn  his 
Laws  of  Ecclesiastical  Polity  Hooker  laid  down  the  lines  on  which 
the  Church  is  reared,  against  the  Puritan  onslaught.  There  is  a 
good  deal  in  Hooker's  view  of  the  relations  between  Church  and 
State  that  is  defective,  but  at  that  period  the  relative  situation 
of  these  powers  was  altogether  different  from  what  it  is  now. 

Moreover  the  tone  of  feeling  towards  the  foreign  Reformers 
was  greatly  altered.  Beza  wrote  from  Geneva  to  the  college  of 
Bishops,  imploring  money  contributions  to  assist  the  Calvinists 
to  withstand  the  forces  of  the  Duke  of  Savoy.  Fuller  says  : 
"  Wonder  not  that  Geneva's  wants  found  no  more  pity  from  the 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  15 


Episcopal  party,  seeing  all  those  Bishops  were  dead  who,  formerly 
exiles,  in  the  Marian  days,  had  found  favour  and  relief  in  Geneva, 
and  now  a  new  generation  arose,  having  as  little  affection  as 
obligation  to  that  government." 

But  although  the  Puritan  reformers  had  invaded  the  ministry 
of  the  Church,  they  were  not  as  yet  in  a  majority,  nor  as  yet 
were  the  people  disposed  to  relish  their  ministrations. 

Cambridge  University  had  become  a  hot-bed  of  Calvinism, 
and  was  pouring  forth  men  affected  in  heart  and  mind  with  heresy. 
Lord  Clarendon  wrote,  but  of  a  later  period  than  the  reign  of 
Elizabeth  and  that  of  James  :  "I  must  not  forget,  though  it 
cannot  be  remembered  without  horror,  that  this  strange  wild-fire 
among  the  people  was  not  so  much  kindled  by  the  Parliament  as 
by  certain  of  the  clergy.  These  men  having  creeped  into,  and 
at  last  driven  from  their  pulpits  all  the  learned  and  orthodox 
clergy,  had,  under  the  pretence  of  reformation,  and  extirpation 
of  Popery,  infused  seditious  inclinations  into  the  hearts  of  men 
against  the  present  Government  and  the  Church." 

Side  by  side  might  be  seen  two  parishes,  in  one  the  priest 
holding  and  teaching  high  Sacramental  doctrines  and  evidencing 
them  by  his  performance  of  divine  worship,  and  a  couple  of 
miles  away  would  be  a  Puritan  denouncing  everything  Catholic 
and  with  his  church  divested  of  all  sacred  ornaments. 

The  condition  of  affairs  under  Elizabeth  cannot  have  been 
very  different  from  what  they  are  at  the  present  day,  in  outward 
appearance.  Now  we  have  a  High  Church  with  advanced 
ritual,  and  hard  by  one  with  none  at  all.  But  the  resemblance 
is  superficial  only.  Then  the  Catholic-minded  clergy  were  dying 
out ;  moreover,  the  new  generation  of  the  same  type  had  not 
come  on,  and  a  flood  of  Puritanism  was  rising,  soon  to  over- 
whelm and  sweep  the  Church  away ;  whereas  now  it  is  only 
where  some  rare  fanatical  patron  exists,  or  where  one  of  the 
Evangelical  patronage  boards  has  control,  that  the  relics  of 
ultra-Puritanism  have  been  left  jutting  out  amidst  a  rising  and 
advancing  tide  of  High  Churchism.  I  do  not  now  refer  to  the 
moderate  Evangelical.  I  give  views  of  two  churches  in  the 
West  of  England.  In  one  the  doors  are  locked  throughout 
the  week,  the  Sunday  services  are  cheerless,  the  Holy  Com- 
munion is  celebrated  once  a  month  only.  In  all  others  round 
the  doors  are  always  open,  matins  and  evensong  are  said  or 
sung  daily,  the  Eucharist  is  celebrated,  not  on  Sunday  alone, 
but  frequently  during  the  week  as  well,  and  the  services  are 


16 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


warm  and  rousing.  It  must  have  been  somewhat  thus  in 
Elizabethan  times,  with  this  difference,  that  the  Catholic  clergy 
were  depressed,  whereas  the  Puritans  were  full  of  fire  and 
assurance — the  reverse  of  the  conditions  at  the  present  day. 

A  considerable  number  of  clergy  who  had  conformed  under 
Mary,  or  had  been  then  instituted,  remained  on  under  Elizabeth, 
as  we  have  seen ;  these  put  aside  their  Missals  and  Breviaries, 
and  used  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer.  We  know  that  the  lay 
Romanists  attended  their  ministrations  till  Pope  Pius  X  issued 
a  bull  of  excommunication  against  Elizabeth  (April  27,  1570) 
and  absolved  her  subjects  from  the  oath  of  allegiance.  Then, 
and  not  till  then,  did  they  desert  their  parish  churches,  but  few 
clergy  followed  their  lead.1 

I  think,  unless  I  am  greatly  mistaken,  that  we  have  in  Iceland 
a  picture  of  the  condition  of  affairs  in  the  Church  in  early  years 
under  Elizabeth.  In  Iceland  the  last  bishop  had  been  executed 
by  order  of  the  King  of  Denmark,  and  thenceforth  the  Apostolic 
Succession  ceased.  The  new  hierarchy  in  Denmark  and  Iceland 
devolved  from  Professor  Buggenhagen,  who,  against  his  con- 
science, was  compelled  by  King  Christian  to  consecrate  a  new 
series  of  bishops,  though  he  himself  was  only  in  priest's  orders. 

However,  of  that  the  Icelanders  knew  nothing.  There,  only 
the  relics — and  the  head  of  S.  Thorlac  proved  to  be  a  cocoanut — 
were  destroyed,  and  images  that  had  received  idolatrous  worship 
were  burnt,  otherwise  little  was  altered.  The  Mass  was  trans- 
lated into  the  vernacular.  The  screens  still  divided  the  chancel 
from  the  nave,  the  priest  still  wore  the  Eucharistic  vestments, 
as  he  does  to  this  day ;  the  wafer  bread  is  still  used  for  Com- 
munion, on  the  altar  are  still  the  lighted  candles  and  the  crucifix, 
and  the  priest  still  sings  the  Mass  to  the  old  inflexions. 

Now,  in  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  the  vast  majority  of  the  clergy 
had  been  accustomed  to  sing  the  Mass,  to  wear  the  vestments, 
and  preach  the  Catholic  faith.  They  did  not  care  three  straws 
for  the  Pope,  and  so  they  continued  on.  The  liturgy  was  in 
English,  that  was  an  advantage,  just  as  in  Iceland  the  liturgy 
is  in  Icelandic. 

But  in  England  there  was  a  disturbing  element  that  did  not 
exist  in  Iceland — the  Marian  exiles  returning  from  Frankfort, 

The  original  Vicar  of  Bray  is  said  to  have  been  Simon  Aleyn,  who 
was  Vicar  of  Bray  about  1540  and  died  in  1588,  so  that  he  was  Vicar  for 
fifty  years,  in  the  reigns  of  Henry  VIII,  Edward  VI,  Mary,  and  Elizabeth. 
There  were  many  like  him.  The  song  relative  to  the  Vicar  of  Bray  was 
composed  about  1720,  and  refers  to  another  conformist  priest. 


IN  THE  STREAM 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  17 


Geneva,  Zurich  and  Strassburg,  with  their  heads  full  of  desire 
to  upset  everything  that  savoured  of  historic  Christianity ;  and 
what  remained  as  a  link  with  the  past  they  would  ruthlessly 
snap.  Consequently  there  were  two  diametrically  opposed 
currents  of  feeling  and  of  practice  in  the  Elizabethan  Church. 
That  it  was  so  is  shown  by  Cecil's  report  to  the  Queen  in  1564. 
He  complained  that  some  said  the  service  in  the  chancel,  some 
in  the  body  of  the  church,  some  in  surplices  and  some  without. 
In  some  churches  the  Holy  Table  was  in  the  chancel,  in  others 
in  the  nave,  in  some  set  altar-wise  against  the  wall  and  vested 
with  a  comely  carpet,  in  others  it  was  without  any  covering. 
Some  celebrated  the  Holy  Communion  in  surplice  and  cope,  some 
with  only  surplice,  some  with  neither  ;  some  with  unleavened, 
others  with  common  bread.  The  Queen  was  highly  incensed 
with  the  Bishops  for  allowing  such  an  indecent  want  of  system 
to  prevail,  and  ordered  Archbishop  Parker  to  correct  these 
abuses.  Under  pressure  the  malcontents  adopted  measures  to 
obtain  what  they  wanted,  and  that  with  considerable  ingenuity; 
for  it  was  open  to  any  discontented  personages  to  found  lecture- 
ships in  any  parish,  and  no  law  existed  against  it,  and  the  lecturers 
were  often  firebrands,  setting  the  parish  in  a  blaze  and  ruining 
the  work  of  the  parish  priest.  These  men  invaded  the  Church, 
defied  all  order,  and  stirred  up  strife,  till  every  parish  was  torn 
into  factions,  and  religion  perished  in  controversy. 

Shrewd  men  saw  that  this  system  was  bound  to  lead  to  great 
mischief,  just  as  the  invasion  of  the  churches  by  members  of 
the  Religious  Orders  before  the  Reformation  had  led  to  the 
weakening  of  the  influence  of  the  curate,  and  had  conduced  to 
laxity.  In  1630,  Heylin,  in  a  sermon  preached  at  Oxford  on 
the  Parable  of  the  Tares,  said,  that  "  the  planting  of  pensionary 
lecturers  in  so  many  places  will  bring  forth  those  fruits  that 
will  appear  to  be  a  Tare  indeed  ;  tho'  now  no  wheat  be 
accounted  fairer  "  ;  and  he  plainly  stated  that  their  object  was 
"  to  cry  down  the  established  clergy,  undermine  the  public 
liturgy  and  so  forth." 

These  lecturers  formed,  so  to  speak,  an  order  of  preachers  in 
parish  churches  distinct  from  rector  or  vicar  and  curate.  They 
were  often  chosen  by  the  vestry  or  chief  inhabitants  of  the 
parish,  and  supported  by  voluntary  subscriptions  and  legacies  ; 
very  often  they  were  the  chaplains  of  the  landed  gentry. 

Everywhere  they  became  an  element  of  discord,  forming 
about  themselves  a  party  hostile  to  the  parish  incumbent,  gather- 
2 


18 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


ing  about  them  all  the  discontented,  perverse,  and  era  vers  after 
novelty. 

They  became  very  numerous,  and  everywhere  agitated  against 
Ecclesiastical  Order.  In  the  reign  of  Charles  II  an  Act  was 
passed  (13  and  14  Chas.  II,  c.  4)  to  curtail  their  licence.  Unless 
sanctioned  by  the  Ordinary,  and  conforming  to  the  Liturgy, 
they  were  to  be  disabled,  and  suffer  three  months'  imprisonment 
in  the  common  gaol ;  and  two  justices,  or  the  mayor  in  a  town 
corporate,  were  required,  upon  certificate  from  the  Bishop,  to 
commit  them  accordingly.  Nevertheless,  where  the  lectureships 
were  founded  by  donations  of  pious  persons,  the  appointment 
of  the  lecturers  was  to  be  with  the  founders  without  any  inter- 
position or  consent  of  the  rectors  of  churches,  but  licensed  by 
the  Bishop. 

But  such  checks  did  not  exist  in  the  reigns  of  James  I  and 
Charles  I.  Laud  vainly  endeavoured  to  reduce  these  men  to 
order  ;  even  to  the  present  day,  such  lectureships  as  survive  are 
often  enough  sources  of  discord. 

Nor  was  this  all.  In  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  Burleigh  through- 
out favoured  the  Puritanical  reformers — even  that  turbulent 
Cartwright  who  was  Republican  in  his  politics  as  well  as  Calvin- 
istic  in  his  religious  tenets.  Several  of  the  nobility  also  were 
with  them.  They  had  been  in  terror  during  the  reign  of  Queen 
Mary  lest  they  should  be  called  on  to  disgorge  some  of  the  Church 
plunder  on  which  they  fattened,  and  they  desired  to  keep  the 
Church  debilitated  and  distracted,  lest  at  any  time  she  should 
become  strong  enough  to  reclaim  some  of  that  of  which  she  had 
been  despoiled ;  and  this  was  not  only  monastic  lands,  but  glebe 
and  episcopal  estates  which  had  also  been  annexed  by  un- 
scrupulous laymen.  These  patrons,  as  the  old  Marian  clergy 
died  out,  nominated  to  cures  men  steeped  in  Genevan  vinegar, 
soured  to  the  marrow. 

There  was  death  in  the  pot,  because  of  the  wild  gourds  shredded 
into  it,  culled  from  the  Upper  Rhine,  the  Main,  and  the  Lakes 
of  Zurich  and  Leman. 

For  the  last  forty  years  of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  her  efforts 
were  directed  to  curbing  the  insolence  of  the  Calvinists.  In 
1560  she  had  to  issue  a  proclamation  to  restrain  them  from 
defacing  the  statuary  and  breaking  the  stained-glass  windows 
in  the  churches.  Thirty-seven  Puritan  clergy  in  the  diocese 
of  London  were  deprived  because  they  refused  to  conform.  In 
1567  nearly  a  hundred  men  and  women  were  seized  at  Plumbers' 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  19 


Hall  and  punished  for  holding  a  schismatical  prayer-meeting. 
In  1573  Elizabeth  issued  a  proclamation  against  such  as  would 
not  conform  to  the  Prayer  Book.  Led  by  Cartwright  an  attempt 
was  made  to  establish  classes  all  over  England,  by  means  of  which 
the  authority  of  the  Bishops  was  to  be  undermined  as  well  as 
that  of  the  orthodox  clergy  in  their  parishes. 

At  a  meeting  held  in  1582  by  the  malcontents  a  Form  of 
Discipline  was  drawn  up  under  Cartwright  and  Travers,  allowing 
no  subscription  to  anything  except  some  of  the  early  Articles. 
"  Those  ceremonies  in  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer  which,  being 
taken  from  Popery,  are  in  controversy,  do  seem  that  they  ought 
to  be  omitted  and  given  over,  if  it  may  be  done  without  danger 
of  being  put  out  of  the  ministry.  If  subscription  to  the  Articles 
of  Religion  and  to  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer  shall  be  again 
used,  it  is  thought  that  the  Book  of  Articles  may  be  subscribed 
to,  that  is,  unto  such  of  them  only  as  contain  the  sum  of  Chris- 
tian faith,  and  the  doctrines  of  the  sacraments ;  but  neither  the 
rest  of  the  Articles  nor  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer  may  be 
allowed  ;  no,  though  a  man  should  be  deprived  of  his  ministry 
for  it." 

The  Puritans  met  to  hear  the  harangues  of  hot- Gospellers 
and  for  what  they  called  Prophesyings.  In  1593  the  Queen 
appealed  to  Parliament,  and  an  Act  was  passed  providing  that 
those  who  refused  to  attend  church  and  assembled  for  unauthor- 
ized religious  meetings  should  be  banished  the  country.  The 
very  fact  of  this  Puritanical  turbulence  shows  that  there  was  a 
strong  Catholic  element  in  the  country  and  among  the  clergy. 
It  was  the  presence  of  this  which  provoked  the  revolt  of  the 
Puritans.  There  is  no  reason  to  suppose  that  these  fanatics 
carried  any  large  number  of  the  people  with  them. 

The  Millenary  Petition  addressed  to  James  I  showed  how 
exacting  the  Puritan  clergy  had  become.  They  desired  tolera- 
tion for  non-compliance  with  the  rules  of  the  Prayer  Book, 
within  the  limits  of  the  Established  Church.  Bacon  was  for 
indulging  them  with  this,  but  not  so  the  King ;  and  in  the  Hamp- 
ton Court  conference  which  followed,  it  was  made  abundantly 
clear  that  conformity  would  be  enforced  as  much  as  possible. 
It  was  by  no  means  certain  that  the  Puritans  formed  as  a  body 
more  than  one-third  of  the  population  j  which  was  the  propor- 
tion estimated  by  Molin,  the  Venetian  ambassador  in  1607. 
The  feeling  of  the  people  may  be  more  surely  gauged  by  the 
presentments  made  by  the  churchwardens  during  the  Bishops' 


20 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


and  Archbishops'  Visitations.  Most  of  these  are  still  preserved 
at  the  Diocesan  Registries,  and  provide  the  most  exhaustive 
material  we  possess  for  the  internal  history  of  the  Church.  A 
writer  (Mr.  N.  Pocock,  I  believe) 1  has  examined  those  of  the 
Puritan  strongholds  of  Norwich  and  Ely,  with  the  following 
somewhat  surprising  results  :  I.  That,  in  the  main,  the  congre- 
gations over  which  Puritan  ministers  had  been  placed  disagreed 
seriously  with  their  pastors,  and  presented  them  to  the  Bishop's 
Court  for  ceremonial  omissions  or  neglect  of  frequent  services ; 
2.  That  where  there  were  many  Puritan  ministers  in  a  neigh- 
bourhood the  opposition  to  their  neglect  in  compliance  with  the 
rubrics  grew  less  between  1620  and  1630,  and  then  ceased  alto- 
gether ;  3.  That  where  Puritan  ministers  were  few,  opposition 
to  them  continued  strong  even  until  1640 ;  4.  That  during 
nearly  the  whole  epoch,  and  in  nearly  every  county  in  England, 
they  had  but  few  supporters,  and  the  evidence  goes  to  show  that 
until  1620  the  number  of  their  sympathizers  in  any  one  place 
was  extremely  small,  not  attaining  the  dignity  of  a  respectable 
minority  of  the  congregation. 

This  is  significant.  It  shows  that  the  suppression  of  the 
Church  by  Parliament  was  due  to  a  comparatively  small 
faction,  and  that  the  people,  so  far  from  objecting  to  the 
simple  ritual  of  the  Prayer  Book,  resented  its  not  being  com- 
plied with. 

And  now  we  pass  on  to  the  troubles  between  Charles  I  and 
his  Parliament. 

In  February  1640  a  petition  was  presented  to  the  House  of 
Commons  signed  by  many  Puritans  in  London  and  the  counties, 
describing  their  grievances  "  occasioned  by  the  Prelates  "  under 
twenty-eight  heads.  One  was  that  the  Bishops  rendered  the 
clergy  fainthearted  to  preach  the  doctrines  of  Free  Grace,  Pre- 
destination, Election,  etc.  Another  that  they  interfered  with 
the  buying  of  Impropriations  by  sundry  well-affected  persons, 
and  placing  ministers  in  them  who  preached  the  True  Gospel. 
Another  grievance  was  that  the  prelates  would  not  allow  that 
the  Pope  was  Antichrist,  and  that  salvation  was  unattainable 
in  the  Church  of  Rome.  The  fourteenth  was  "  The  great 
conformity  and  likeness  both  continued  and  encreased  of  our 
Church  to  the  Church  of  Rome,  in  Vestures,  Postures,  Cere- 
monies, and  Administrations,  namely  as  the  Bishops'  rochets 

1  "The  People  and  the  Puritan  Movement,"  Church  Quarterly  Review, 
April  1904. 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  21 


and  the  Lawne  sleeves,  the  foure-cornered  Cap,  the  Cope  and 
Surpluse,  the  Tippet,  the  Hood."  The  fifteenth  complains  of 
"  The  standing  up  at  Gloria  Patri,  and  at  the  reading  of  the 
Gospel,  praying  towards  the  East,  bowing  at  the  name  of  Jesus, 
bowing  to  the  Altar,  the  Crosse  in  Baptism  and  the  kneeling  at 
the  Communion." 

The  sixteenth  grievance  is  :  "  The  turning  of  the  Communion 
Tables  Altar- wise,  setting  Images,  Crucifixes,  and  Conceits  over 
them,  and  Tapers  and  Books  upon  them  .  .  .  forcing  people  to 
come  up  thither  to  receive,  or  else  denying  the  Sacrament  to 
them."  The  eighteenth  grievance  is  that  "  The  Liturgie  is 
for  the  most  part  framed  out  of  the  Romish  Breviary,  Rituale, 
and  Mass-book,  also  the  book  of  Ordination,  for  Archbishops 
and  Ministers,  framed  out  of  the  Roman  Pontifical." 

Sir  Edward  Deering,  moreover,  spoke  four  times  on  the  subject 
of  the  interference  of  the  Bishops  with  godly  ministers,  and 
their  issuing,  cum  privilegio,  pamphlets  against  Puritanism,  by 
Cosin,  Do  we,  Heylin,  Pocklington,  Mead,  Shelford,  Swan, 
Roberts,  "  and  many  more."  1 

Only  a  few  days  after  the  opening  of  the  Long  Parliament, 
November  3, 1640,  the  Commons  appointed  a  Grand  Committee, 
consisting  of  the  whole  House,  to  enquire  into  the  characters, 
opinions  and  morals  generally  of  the  clergy,  with  intent  of  purging 
the  Church  of  undesirable  ministers,  undesirable  on  account  of 
their  conduct,  but  undesirable  also  because  hostile  to  the  party 
in  power.  A  general  invitation  was  issued  to  all  sorts  of  persons 
to  get  up  all  sorts  of  complaints  against  their  pastors.  The 
numbers  that  poured  in  made  it  necessary  that  the  Grand  Com- 
mittee should  divide  itself  into  four  or  five. 

If  we  may  trust  the  statements  made  by  the  Committee  for 
sequestrating  livings,  there  were  many  cases  in  which  the  parsons 
were  drunkards  and  swearers.  But  also  there  were  numerous 
cases  of  "  malignancy  " — that  is  to  say  of  believers  in  Episcopacy 
and  of  men  using  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer :  this  sufficed 
as  a  cause  for  expulsion. 

In  July  thirteen  bishops  were  impeached,  and  on  December  30 
following,  ten  of  them  were  sent  to  the  Tower.  It  is  said  that 
no  of  the  clergy  of  the  diocese  of  London  alone  were  turned  out 
of  their  livings  in  1642  and  1643.  As  has  been  already  said, 
large  numbers  of  the  clergy  were  Puritanically  disposed.  These 

1  Speeches  and  Passages  of  this  Great  and  Happy  Parliament  (London, 
1641). 


22 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


drew  up  a  Remonstrance  addressed  to  the  Parliament  "  against 
the  whole  government  of  the  Church/' 

Later  they  added  another  and  a  stronger  petition  to  the  House 
of  Commons,  thanking  Parliament  for  what,  by  purging  the 
Church,  it  had  already  done,  and  urging  to  further  action — the 
setl  ing  aside  of  the  Liturgy  and  the  rubrics ;  and  this  was  actually 
presented  at  the  bar  of  the  House  by  their  prolocutor,  Dr. 
Burgess. 

To  what  an  extent  those  who  were  employed  to  purge  the 
Church  acted  honestly  and  impartially,  it  is  hard  to  say.  In 
different  districts  the  clergy  were  perhaps  differently  treated. 
Mr.  W.  N.  Johns,  in  his  Historical  Traditions  and  Facts  relating 
to  the  County  of  Monmouth  (Newport,  1885),  gives  a  list  of  all  the 
benefices  in  the  county  from  which  the  Committee,  and  later 
Cromwell's  Tryers,  ejected  the  clergy,  to  the  number  of  eighty- 
eight,  many  of  these  as  "  malignants  "  and  as  "  using  the  Prayer 
Book."  Some  were  expelled  for  drunkenness,  others  for  "in- 
efficiency," i.e.  because  they  did  not  come  up  to  the  theological 
standard  set  by  their  judges. 

In  the  County  of  Devon,  out  of  about  550  benefices,  two-thirds 
of  the  parsons  were  deprived.  The  rest  conformed  to  the  re- 
ligion— whatever  it  was — of  the  Parliament. 

For  the  space  of  two  years  the  country  might  be  said  to  have 
been  without  any  established  form  of  worship.  The  clergy  were 
left  to  use  the  Liturgy,  repeating  the  prayers  by  heart  without 
book,  or  not,  as  they  pleased,  and  to  follow  their  own  devices 
in  other  particulars.  Thus,  we  are  told,  while  some  of  them 
continued  to  wear  the  canonical  vesture,  others  gratified  their 
taste  by  preaching  in  a  cloak,  after  the  fashion  of  the  Protestant 
ministers  of  Geneva  and  France. 

In  the  summer  of  1643  it  was  desired  by  Parliament  that  all 
altars  of  stone  in  churches  should  be  taken  away  ;  all  communion 
tables  removed  from  the  east  end  of  the  chancels  and  set  in  the 
nave.  All  rails  were  to  be  pulled  down,  all  candlesticks  and 
tapers  to  be  removed,  and  all  crucifixes  and  pictures  to  be 
destroyed. 

The  building  up  of  a  new  ecclesiastical  polity  was  committed 
to  an  Assembly  of  Divines  that  met  at  Westminster  on  July  1, 
1643.  The  Directory  of  Public  Worship,  which  supplanted  the 
Book  of  Common  Prayer,  was  established  by  an  ordinance 
on  January  3,  1645 ;  the  Christian  Seasons  were  abolished, 
kneeling  was  done  away  with,  hats  were  worn  during  service ; 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  28 


in  1653  marriage  was  made  a  civil  contract  before  a  Justice  of 
Peace. 

The  Puritans  maintained  great  hostility  towards  organs  and 
instrumental  music  in  churches,  and  that  it  caused  dissatis- 
faction when  music  was  put  down,  the  organs  broken  up  and 
the  choirs  dispersed,  one  may  judge  by  the  diffusion  of  a  ballad 
composed  at  the  time,  which  I  have  published  with  its  original 
air  in  my  Songs  of  the  West.  It  is  too  long  to  be  reproduced  here, 
but  I  give  a  few  verses.  I  heard  it  from  an  old  blind  man  on 
Dartmoor  in  1883,  but  it  has  also  been  recovered  at  North 
Tawton,  as  happening  there,  and  in  1877  the  Hon.  A.  F.  Northcote 
took  it  down  from  a  pedlar  at  Buckingham,  aged  ninety  years. 

There's  a  man  in  Brixham  town, 
Of  office,  and  in  gown, 
Strove  to  put  singing  down, 

Which  most  of  men  adore. 
For  House  of  God  unmeet, 
The  voice  and  organ  sweet 
When  pious  men  do  meet 

To  praise  their  God  before. 

Go  question  Holy  Writ, 
And  you  will  find  in  it 
That  seemly  'tis  and  fit 

To  praise  and  hymn  the  Lord, 
On  cymbal  and  on  lute 
On  organ  and  on  flute, 
With  voices  sweet  that  suit 

All  in  a  fair  concord. 

Now  there  be  creatures  three, 
As  you  may  plainly  see, 
With  music  can't  agree 

Upon  this  very  earth  : 
The  swine,  the  fool,  the  ass  ; 
And  so  we  let  it  pass, 
And  sing,  O  Lord,  thy  praise, 

Whilst  we  have  breath. 

There  were  some,  Churchmen  at  heart,  who  conformed  to  the 
Directory  and  to  the  complete  transformation  of  the  Church 
into  a  Presbyterian  establishment.  A  notable  instance  was 
John  Pearson.  He  retained  his  living  at  Torrington  in  Suffolk, 
and  in  1650  was  appointed  lecturer  at  S.  Clement's,  Eastcheap, 
in  London  ;  and  it  was  to  the  parishioners  there,  during  the 


24 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


domination  of  Presbyterians  and  Independents,  that  he  de- 
livered his  Exposition  of  the  Apostles'  Creed. 

We  can  perhaps  understand  his  position,  and  that  of  others 
like  him  who  submitted,  hoping  by  private  advice  and  by  public 
instruction  to  keep  alive  some  spark  of  the  Faith,  and  doubtless 
looking  for  better  times  to  come  ;  but  it  was  hardly  honest.1  To 
a  good  many  must  have  applied  the  words  of  Beatrice  relative  to 
Benedick  :  "He  wears  his  faith  but  as  the  fashion  of  his  hat — it 
ever  changes  with  the  next  block." 

The  Covenant,  moreover,  was  devised  as  a  method  of  assuring 
that  the  ministers  were  in  full  agreement  with  the  religious 
opinions  of  the  Parliament.  On  September  25,  1643,  five  days 
after  the  battle  of  Newbury,  the  Covenant  was  sworn  to  by  the 
members  of  the  House  of  Commons,  and  was  soon  afterwards 
ordered  to  be  sworn  to  by  every  Englishman  ;  and  it  was  imposed 
on  every  incumbent  as  a  test,  and  if  he  refused  to  subscribe 
he  was  treated  as  a  malignant,  ejected  from  his  benefice  with 
wife  and  children,  and  deprived  of  his  goods.  It  was  rendered 
hard  for  the  loyal  country  gentlemen  to  assist  their  pastors,  as 
the  estates  of  malignants  had  been  sequestered. 

All  who  submitted  to  swear  to  the  Covenant  were  accounted 
friends  of  "  the  Blessed  Parliament,"  all  who  refused  it  were 
looked  upon  as  "  spies  and  betrayers  of  the  Parliament."  The 
Covenant  was  ordered  to  be  written  up  in  every  church,  and 
recited  before  the  congregation  by  the  minister  once  in  each 
year.  The  terms  of  the  Covenant  were  emphatic  enough  :  "  We 
shall  sincerely,  really  and  constantly  endeavour,  in  our  several 
places  and  callings,  the  preservation  of  the  Reformed  religion 
in  the  Church  of  Scotland  in  doctrine,  worship,  discipline  and 

1  There  were  many  such  men.  Lewis  Atterbury,  father  of  the  Bishop, 
remained  undisturbed  at  Milston,  Pocock  at  Childrey,  Sanderson  at 
Boothby  Pagnell.  Stillingfleet  was  actually  appointed  to  Sutton  in  1657, 
and  Bull  to  Suddington  in  1658,  all  of  course  conforming  to  the  Directory, 
but  hating  it  in  their  hearts.  So  also  Thomas  Fuller,  the  Church  his- 
torian, presented  to  the  living  of  Waltham  Abbey,  1649,  and  then  that 
of  Cranford,  1658.  Heylin  accused  him  of  complying  with  the  times, 
and  South  pictured  him  with  his  big  book  under  one  arm  and  his  little 
wife  under  the  other,  running  after  his  patrons  for  invitation  to  dinner. 
Hall  was  another  Conformist,  so  also  Westfield,  Bishop  of  Bristol,  who 
attended  the  Westminster  Assembly,  1643,  and  was  allowed  by  Parlia- 
ment to  retain  his  emoluments.  Simon  Patrick  became  Vicar  of  Batter- 
sea  in  1658.  He  had  been  privately  ordained.  After  the  Restoration 
he  became  Vicar  of  S.  Paul's,  Covent  Garden,  and  eventually  in  succession 
Bishop  of  Chichester,  then  of  Ely.  John  Gauden  was  another  who  con- 
formed to  Presbyterianism,  and  was  thereby  enabled  to  retain  his  rector- 
ship of  Bocking.  He  became  successively  Bishop  of  Exeter  and  then  of 
Worcester. 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  25 


government,  against  our  common  enemies  ;  the  Reformation  of 
religion  in  the  kingdoms  of  England  and  Ireland,  in  doctrine, 
worship,  discipline  and  government  according  to  the  word  of 
God,  and  the  example  of  the  best  Reformed  Churches,  and  shall 
endeavour  to  bring  the  churches  of  God  in  the  three  kingdoms 
to  the  nearest  conjunction  and  uniformity  in  religion,  confession 
of  faith,  form  of  church  government,  directory  for  worship  and 
catechising.  That  we  shall  in  like  manner,  without  respect  of 
persons,  endeavour  the  extirpation  of  Popery,  Prelacy  (that  is 
Church  government  by  archbishops,  bishops,  their  chancellors 
and  commissaries,  deans  and  chapters,  archdeacons  and  all  other 
ecclesiastical  officers,  depending  on  that  hierarchy)  superstition, 
heresy,  schism,  profaneness,  etc." 

Some  of  the  old  clergy  counted  up  the  words  of  the  Covenant, 
and  found  them  to  be  666,  the  number  of  the  Beast.  But  what 
is  startling  is  that  so  many  acquiesced  in  the  Covenant,  took 
oath,  and  remained  on  in  their  cures.  Thomas  Fuller  apologizes 
for  his  conformity  by  saying  that  he  knew  nothing  of  the  Covenant 
save  seeing  it  hung  up  in  the  Church,  but  he  admits  that  he  took 
the  oath  in  the  vestry  of  the  Savoy  chapel. 

By  ordinance  of  Parliament,  May  9,  1644,  it  was  directed 
"  that  no  copes,  surplices,  superstitious  vestments,  roods  or 
roodloms  .  .  .  shall  be,  or  be  any  more  used  in  any  Church 
or  Chapell,  within  the  Realm  .  .  .  and  that  all  copes,  surplices, 
Superstitious  Vestments,  Roods  and  Fonts  aforesaid,  be  like- 
wise utterly  defaced." 

By  an  Act  of  Parliament  passed  on  June  6,  1646,  the  Presby- 
terian form  of  Church  Government  was  partially  established  by 
way  of  experiment,  the  preamble  of  the  Act  declaring  "  that  if 
upon  trial  it  was  not  found  acceptable,  it  should  be  reversed 
or  amended,"  but  in  1649  was  declared  without  qualification 
by  the  House,  that  Presbyterianism  should  be  the  Established 
religion. 

This  was  the  year  in  which  the  Commonwealth  was  established. 
In  1653,  however,  Cromwell  dissolved  the  Long  Parliament,  and 
on  December  16  in  that  year  became  Lord  Protector.  With 
him  Independency  had  the  upper  hand  and  the  Presbyterians 
could  ask  for  nothing  but  toleration.  Their  Directory  was  now 
scouted,  and  complete  religious  anarchy  prevailed. 

The  Protector  was  disposed  to  tolerate  all  sects,  but  not 
Romanists,  Anglicans  and  Quakers. 

In  March  1653  Cromwell,  by  an  Ordinance  in  Council,  ap- 


26 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


pointed  a  Board  of  Tryers,  thirty-eight  in  number,  of  whom 
part  were  Presbyterians,  part  Independents,  and  a  few  Baptists, 
to  which  was  accorded,  without  any  instructions  or  limitations 
whatever,  the  power  of  examining  and  approving,  or  rejecting, 
all  persons  that  might  thereafter  be  presented  or  nominated  to 
any  living  in  the  Church.  There  was  also  instituted  a  Commis- 
sion of  Ejectors,  to  turn  out  those  who,  being  in  possession, 
were  deemed  unworthy,  and  such  as  employed  the  Prayer 
Book.1 

Those  of  the  sequestered  priests  who  were  unmarried  were 
taken  into  the  families  of  the  country  squires,  where  they  served 
as  tutors  and  chaplains,  and  used  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer 
and  ministered  the  Sacraments  in  secret.  The  Bishops  behind 
shut  and  locked  doors  ordained  to  the  priesthood.  The  married 
incumbents  who  had  been  ejected  became  schoolmasters  in  the 
parishes  in  which  they  had  ministered  as  priests.  But  in  1655 
the  Protector  issued  an  edict  forbidding  any  ejected  incumbent 
from  keeping  a  school,  acting  as  tutor  in  a  private  family,  per- 
forming any  rite  of  the  Church,  or  using  the  Book  of  Common 
Prayer,  and  the  major-generals  were  ordered  to  see  that  it  was 
duly  enforced.  Yet  Cromwell  must  have  felt  towards  his  end 
that  his  efforts  to  stamp  out  the  Church  were  doomed  to  failure, 
for  his  daughters  were  sincere  Churchwomen,  and  attended  the 
ministrations  and  received  the  Sacrament  at  the  hands  of  a 
proscribed  priest  in  a  private  house,  and  had  themselves  married 
by  one.2 

There  is  a  wooden  parish  church  at  Reykjahlid  by  Myvatn, 
in  the  north-east  of  Iceland.  Between  1724  and  1730  ensued 
a  sequence  of  irruptions  from  three  volcanic  vents  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood. These  poured  forth  a  river  of  molten  lava  that  flowed 
down  to  the  lake  and  menaced  to  overwhelm  the  church ;  but 
the  fiery  flood  parted  at  the  churchyard  bank  and  encompassed 
God's  acre,  spared  the  sacred  building,  save  that  it  charred  and 
started  its  planks  ;  it  slew  all  the  fish  in  the  lake,  poisoned  man 

1  What  the  judgments  of  the  Committee  were  worth  may  be  seen  by 
that  on  Edmund  Pocock,  the  great  Orientalist  and  Arabic  professor  at 
Oxford,  who  only  just  escaped  expulsion  from  his  living  of  Childrey  "  for 
ignorance  and  insufficiency."  And  he  one  with  an  European  reputation 
for  learning  ! 

2  Mary  was  married  to  Lord  Fauconberg  by  the  Rev.  Dr.  Hewit.  Crom- 
well had  him  executed  on  the  pretence  that  he  was  engaged  in  a  plot, 
with  which,  in  fact,  he  had  little  concern.  The  last  Roman  Catholic 
priest  who  was  executed  for  his  religion  in  England  suffered  under  Crom- 
well . 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  27 


and  beast  with  its  mephitic  exhalations,  and  buried  wide  tracts 
of  pasture. 

The  Edwardian  and  Elizabethan  periods  were  much  like  this. 
From  Switzerland,  the  Rhine  and  the  Main  was  vomited  forth 
the  poisonous  and  desolating  torrent  that  overflowed  our  land, 
killing  all  spiritual  religion  and  common  morality,  and  substi- 
tuting for  them  acrid  controversy,  unprofitable  dogmatism,  and 
relaxation  of  morals.  It  did  appear  as  though  the  Church 
must  perish,  surrounded  as  it  was  by  the  incandescent  current 
of  Calvinism.  But  by  the  mercy  of  God — as  by  a  miracle — it 
survived. 

I  have  seen  Reykjahlid.  The  desolating  torrent  is  congealed 
into  fanged  fragments  of  rock,  that  produce  not  a  blade  of  grass 
nor  a  goodly  flower.  It  has  been  so  in  England  ;  the  stream  has 
expended  its  heat,  has  lost  its  momentum,  and  remains  a  petri- 
faction without  vitality  and  without  productiveness. 


CHAPTER  II 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  (continued) 

FROM  l660  ONWARDS 

AT  the  Restoration,  in  1660,  the  parish  churches  were 
served  by  two  classes  of  men  :  such  as  had  received 
Episcopal  ordination  and  had  conformed  willingly  or 
reluctantly ;  and  such  as  were  Presbyterians  or  Indepen- 
dents or  even  Baptist  preachers,  and  who  had  not  been  ordained. 

Where  there  had  been  intrusion  into  benefices,  and  the  original 
rectors  or  vicars  were  still  alive  in  1660,  these  latter  were  re- 
stored, and  the  intruders  had  to  go.  But  of  this  class  there  were 
not  many.    Poverty  and  hardship  had  killed  most  of  them. 

Those  ordained  who  had  conformed  to  the  Directory  now 
made  a  second  turn  of  the  coat,  back  to  the  Prayer  Book  and  to 
Episcopacy.  Some  of  these  profited  greatly  thereby.  They 
could  produce  their  letters  of  Orders,  and  show  that  they  had  been 
canonically  instituted  before  the  Rebellion.  Pearson  at  once 
got  preferment.  He  was  presented  to  the  rectory  of  S.  Christo- 
pher in  the  City,  became  prebendary  of  Ely,  archdeacon  of 
Surrey,  and  in  1672  Bishop  of  Chester. 

Some  of  those  restored  must  have  been  of  questionable  value. 
No  inquisition  seems  to  have  been  made  as  to  whether  those 
reinstated  had  been  deprived  for  their  orthodoxy  or  for  their 
disreputable  conduct. 

We  obtain  a  tolerable  insight  into  the  condition  of  affairs  from 
Pepys's  Diary.  Samuel  Pepys,  born  on  February  23,  1632-3, 
had  known  nothing  of  Church  doctrine  and  order.  At  the  time 
of  the  Restoration  he  lived  in  the  parish  of  S.  Olave,  Hart  Street, 
London,  and  the  incumbent  was  Daniel  Mills. 

Mills  had  been  appointed  to  S.  Olave 's,  April  17,  1657,  Dv  tne 
Commissioners  or  Tryers,  under  Cromwell's  Protectorate,  as  a 
godly  minister.  He  died  in  1689,  a  bit  of  a  pluralist,  as  rector 
of  S.  Olave's  and  also  of  Wanstead  in  Essex.  He  had  not  been 
episcopally  ordained,  but  was  quite  prepared  to  conform,  even 
before  he  was  obliged  to  do  so.    Pepys  wrote  : 

28 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  29 


"  1660.  4  Nov.  (Lord's  Day). — In  the  morn  at  our  Church 
(S.  Olave's),  where  Mr.  Mills  did  begin  to  nibble  at  the  Common 
Prayer  by  saying  *  Glory  be  to  the  Father,  etc.'  after  he  had 
read  two  psalms,  but  the  people  had  been  so  little  used  to  it, 
that  they  could  not  tell  what  to  answer. 

"  1662.  5  October  (Lord's  Day). — I  to  Church  and  this  day 
the  parson  had  got  someone  to  read,  with  the  surplice  on.  I 
suppose  himself  will  take  it  up  hereafter,  for  a  cunning  fellow 
he  is  as  any  of  his  coate. 

"  1662.  26  October  (Lord's  Day). — To  Church  and  there  saw 
for  the  first  time  Mr.  Mills  in  a  surplice,  but  it  seemed  absurd 
for  him  to  pull  it  over  his  ears  in  the  reading  pew,  after  he  had 
done,  before  all  the  church,  to  go  up  to  the  pulpit t." 

When  the  Savoy  Conference  met  (April  15- July  25,  1661) 
there  were  twelve  Bishops  on  one  side,  and  twelve  eminent 
Presbyterians  on  the  other,  and  the  object  of  the  conference 
was  to  consider  whether  it  were  possible  to  so  modify  the  Prayer 
Book  as  to  satisfy  the  Puritans  and  allow  them  to  retain  their 
cures.  But  it  soon  appeared  that  the  differences  were  radical, 
and  that  conciliation  was  impossible.  The  Presbyterians  de- 
manded the  disuse  of  the  title  "  priest,"  the  abolition  of  Lent 
and  Saints'  days,  permission  to  use  extempore  prayers  as  well  as 
printed  forms  at  the  discretion  of  the  minister,  the  omission  of 
the  sign  of  the  cross  in  baptism,  and  of  the  ring  in  matrimony  ; 
the  discontinuance  of  kneeling  for  the  reception  of  Communion  ; 
they  also  objected  to  Baptismal  Regeneration ,  and  Confirmation 
as  a  preliminary  to  Communion  ;  they  demanded  as  well  the 
excision  of  the  Ornaments  Rubric.  They  were  prepared  to 
consent  to  Episcopacy  if  the  Bishops  were  to  be  relegated  to 
the  office  of  superintendents  and  moderators  among  pastors, 
each  to  be  primus  inter  pares,  and  that  no  obligation  to  be 
ordained  should  be  imposed  upon  those  who  had  received  their 
mission  from  the  Presbyterian  classes.  "  In  a  word  they  sought 
the  triumph  of  Puritanism  over  the  Church,  not  a  footing  for 
Puritanism  within  the  pale  of  the  Church." 

It  was  impossible  to  concede  these  demands  without  un- 
churching the  Anglican  Communion,  making  of  it  a  Protestant 
sect  among  other  sects.  And  it  would  have  driven  out  of  the 
fold  all  those  who  belonged  to  the  old  school,  regarding  the 
Episcopate  and  Apostolic  Succession  as  of  Divine  institution, 
and  the  Church  Catholic  as  the  Kingdom  of  Christ  upon  earth. 
The  Prayer  Book  went  through  its  final  revision  in  1661.  The 


30 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Title  itself  is  significant :  "  The  Book  of  Common  Prayer  and 
the  administration  of  the  Sacraments,  and  other  rites  and  cere- 
monies of  the  Church,  according  to  the  use  of  the  United  Church 
of  England  and  Ireland." 

The  First  Preface  was  a  refutation  of  the  Puritans.  The 
Second  is  an  adaptation  from  the  revised  Breviary  of  Cardinal 
Quignon  authorized  by  Pope  Paul  III  in  1535  ;  and  this  it 
follows  in  all  the  main  points.  Nothing  can  show  plainer  that  the 
Reformers  meant  not  to  create  a  new  service-book  but  to  reform 
the  old.  The  words  of  the  Preface  make  this  clear.  Four  times 
in  it  is  the  authority  of  the  "  Ancient  Fathers  "  invoked. 

In  the  Third  Preface  no  hint  of  revolutionary  change  is  given  ; 
indeed  it  does  not  hesitate  to  declare  that  innovations  are  always 
to  be  eschewed. 

The  Act  of  Uniformity  was  passed  in  1662.  All  ministers 
were  required  to  accept  and  employ  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer, 
and  such  as  had  not  been  episcopally  ordained  were  required 
to  seek  orders  from  the  Bishop,  before  S.  Bartholomew's  Day, 
August  24,  or  to  vacate  their  incumbencies. 

It  has  been  stated  by  Calamy  and  Baxter  that  from  1500  to 
2465  ministers  were  ejected.  J.  R.  Green,  in  his  Short  History, 
says  that  it  was  only  one-fifth  of  the  clergy.  Burnet  himself 
doubted  whether  anything  like  the  number  had  to  leave  that 
was  supposed.  "  The  numbers,"  he  says,  "  have  been  much 
controverted."  1 

According  to  Clarendon  a  great  many  of  those  who  vacated 
their  livings  did  so  on  "  bluff,"  hoping  to  get  better  terms,  but 
conformed  afterwards  when  they  found  out  that  the  Government 
meant  what  it  said. 

In  Ichabod,  published  in  1663,  a  work  attributed  to  Ken, 
figures  are  quoted  to  the  effect  that  out  of  12,000  benefices, 
3,000  were  in  impropriate  hands,  and  that  there  were  4,000 
incumbents  who  were  not  resident. 

If  we  take  it  that  6,000  benefices  were  really  occupied  and  that 
2,000  ministers  were  ejected,  of  whom  a  good  many  returned, 
it  would  leave  between  4,000  and  5,000  who  conformed.  But 
this  takes  no  account  of  cathedral  and  collegiate  establishments, 
and  it  is  not  certain  that  these  12,000  benefices  represent  all 
that  there  were  in  the  English  Church  at  that  time. 

Mr.  W.  N.  Johns,  in  his  Historical  Traditions  and  Facts  relating 
to  the  County  of  Monmouth  (Newport,  1885),  gives  a  list  of  all 

1  Calamy  records  2,465,  but  of  these  a  large  number  conformed  later. 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  31 


the  benefices  in  the  county  from  which  the  Committee  and  the 
Tryers  ejected  the  clergy.  It  would  seem  from  this  that  88 
were  driven  out  of  their  livings;  of  these  at  the  Restoration 
only  five  lived  to  be  reinstated. 

In  1660-2  the  number  ejected  was  11,  so  that  something 
like  72  must  have  conformed.  Here,  as  Prince  Hal  might  say, 
"  O  monstrous  !  but  one  halfpenny  of  bread  to  this  intolerable 
deal  of  sack  !  "  Five  orthodox  clergy  to  72  reclaimed  Puritans  ! 

Now  let  us  take  Devonshire  in  the  diocese  of  Exeter.  The 
registers  have  been  closely  investigated  by  the  late  Rev.  G.  L. 
Hennessy  with  these  results.  Out  of  about  550  benefices  in 
Devon,  52  ministers  were  deprived. 

There  were  35  benefices  jam  legitime  vacantes.  In  the  city  of 
Exeter  there  had  been  19  churches,  but  by  Act  of  Parliament 
in  1656  these  were  reduced  to  4.  This  would  account  for  15 
legitimately  vacant. 

Of  the  52  deprived  some  were  intruders,  the  original  incum- 
bents being  still  alive.  One  was  vacated  on  account  of  Non- 
conformity, and  one  on  account  of  contempt  and  disobedience. 
This  leaves  462  incumbents  remaining.  In  1660-3  there  were 
177  ordained  by  Bishops  Gauden  and  Seth  Ward.  These  were 
Conformists,  leaving  343  in  quiet  possession,  who  had  been 
ordained  before  the  troubles,  and  had  conformed  to  Presbyterian- 
ism  and  now  conformed  again  to  Episcopacy. 

But  that  is  not  all. 

Among  the  ministers  who  had  not  been  ordained,  some  were 
allowed  from  ten  to  twelve  years'  grace  in  which  to  make  up 
their  minds  whether  to  conform  or  not.  Whether  this  was  done 
in  other  dioceses  I  am  unable  to  say.  The  number  of  time- 
servers  like  Mr.  Mills  was  great — "  cunning  fellows  as  any  of  their 
coate." 

The  Bishops  could  not  be  exacting.  They  were  constrained 
to  fill  the  benefices  with  such  men  as  they  could  get.  An  entire 
generation  had  sprung  up  without  having  received  any  training, 
any  Church  teaching,  knowing  nothing  of  the  traditions  of 
Church  service.1  Only  some  elders  remembered  what  the  Church 
had  been  and  what  Church  principles  were. 

There  had  been,  as  we  have  seen,  a  large  number  of  parochial 
clergy,  who  had  been  ordained,  but  had  been  carried  away  by 

1  From  Ichabod  we  learn  that  426  tradesmen  who  had  been  intruded 
into  livings  during  the  Commonwealth  now  submitted  to  ordination  so 
as  to  retain  their  livings. 


32 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


the  current  of  Puritanism.  These  had  not  been  ejected  during 
the  Commonwealth,  and  they  now  remained  in  their  cures, 
though  out  of  sympathy  with  the  rites  and  doctrines  of  the 
Church. 

Then  there  were  the  Conformists,  who,  to  retain  their  parson- 
ages and  incomes,  submitted  to  ordination,  and  undertook  to 
use  the  Prayer  Book. 

According  to  Archdeacon  Basire  and  Dean  Granville,  con- 
temporaries, a  great  many  of  these  Conformists  took  the  oaths 
but  did  not  keep  them  ;  not  merely  neglecting  to  use  the  Book 
of  Common  Prayer,  but  preaching  against  the  institutions  to 
which  they  had  sworn  submission.1  To  use  Dean  Granville's 
own  words  :  "  they  preach  with  cloven  tongues  and  walk  with 
cloven  feet." 

Mr.  Green  is  probably  right  in  his  estimate  that  only  one- 
fifth  were  ejected.  The  two-  or  three-fifths  that  remained  were 
secretly  hostile  to  the  Catholic  faith  and  scorned  the  Church 
rites  ;  and  the  quality  of  those  who  filled  up  the  gaps  was  of 
more  than  dubious  value. 

When  Nathaniel  Heywood  was  required  to  conform  or  to 
quit  the  parish  of  Ormskirk,  he  was  urged  to  accept  the  first 
alternative,  but  said  he  could  not  do  so  for  conscience'  sake. 
"  Oh,  sir,"  said  a  parishioner,  "  many  a  man  nowadays  makes  a 
great  gulp  in  his  conscience — can  you  not  make  a  little  nick  in 
yours  ?  "  And,  in  fact,  many  did  make  this  little  nick.  They 
conformed  with  their  lips,  but  in  heart  they  were  with  the  old 
Puritanism,  and  they  performed  Divine  Service  in  a  way  that 
showed  that  they  despised  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer. 

From  the  time  of  Charles  I  to  that  of  the  reign  of  Charles  II, 
the  bulk  of  the  clergy  had  been  weathercocks  veering  with  every 
wind ;  first  of  all  Churchmen,  then  Presbyterians,  next  Inde- 
pendents, and  finally  Churchmen  again,  but  with  their  Church- 
manship  so  diluted  as  to  be  scarcely  discoverable. 

Pepys  enters  in  his  Diary,  August  24,  1662,  the  very  day  of 
"  Black  Bartholomew  "  :  "To  Church,  where  Mr.  Mills,  making 
a  sermon  on  Confession,  he  did  endeavour  to  pull  down  Auricular 
Confession,  but  did  set  it  up  by  his  bad  arguments  against  it, 
and  advising  people  to  come  to  him  to  confess  their  sins,  when 
they  had  any  weight  upon  their  consciences,  as  much  as  possibly, 
which  did  vex  me  to  hear."  2 

1  Overton  (J.  H.),  Life  in  the  English  Church  (London,  1885),  p.  1. 

2  Yet  even  Pepys  eventually  went  to  Confession  to  Hickes. 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH 


33 


Now,  we  have  seen,  Mills  had  been  a  Puritan  minister,  and  he 
had  just  been  ordained,  so  as  to  be  able  to  retain  the  cure  of 
S.  Olave's.  With  his  ordination  he  had  made  a  volte-face,  and 
was  now  desirous  of  using  the  power  of  the  keys  conferred  on 
him  a  few  days  before. 

Had  Edmund  Calamy  the  Elder  been  willing  to  conform  he 
was  to  have  been  given  the  Bishoprics  of  Coventry  and  Lich- 
field ;  and  the  sees  were  kept  open  for  him  till  December  1661  ; 
and  Baxter,  an  ultra- Presbyterian,  might  have  had  the  Bishopric 
of  Hereford,  had  he  been  less  honest. 

Some  of  the  Conformists  did  well  for  themselves :  such  were 
William  Outram,  who  died  prebendary  of  Westminster ;  such 
also  was  Timothy  Tully,  a  "  bright  particular  star  "  of  Pres- 
byterianism  while  the  Commonwealth  lasted,  who  altered  his 
orbit,  and  conforming,  became  Canon  of  York.  Thomas  Tully, 
another,  became  Dean  of  Ripon.  Such  also  was  John  Tillotson, 
of  whom  more  presently.  So  also  Richard  Kidder  (a  Presby- 
terian and  Republican),  who  had  held  the  living  of  Stanground 
during  the  Rebellion,  and  was  ejected  from  it  as  a  Nonconformist 
under  the  Act  of  Uniformity.  But  he  felt  uncomfortable  out 
in  the  cold,  and  conformed.  William  III  gave  him  the  see  of 
Bath  and  Wells,  from  which  he  had  ejected  the  saintly  Bishop 
Ken.  He  and  his  wife  were  killed  together  in  a  storm,  1703,  by 
the  fall  of  a  stack  of  chimneys  on  the  bed  in  which  they  were 
sleeping.  Samuel  Parker,  who  had  posed  as  a  Presbyterian  of 
the  straitest  section,  changed  at  the  Restoration,  became  Arch- 
deacon of  Canterbury  and  Bishop  of  Oxford.  Reynolds,  a 
staunch  and  convinced  Presbyterian,  put  his  convictions  in  his 
pocket,  conformed  and  became  Bishop  of  Norwich.  What  could 
be  expected  of  such  turncoats  ? 

This  flood  of  Conformists,  bred  in  ultra-Calvinism,  knowing 
nothing  of  the  faith  of  the  Church,  ignorant  as  to  the  significance 
of  the  ceremonies  and  sacraments  of  the  Church,  but  who  were 
too  worldly  to  endure  the  annoyance  of  expulsion  from  their 
cures,  racked  the  Church  to  her  bones.  When  the  Earl  of  Man- 
chester told  King  Charles,  during  the  debate  on  the  Act  of  Uni- 
formity, that  he  was  afraid  the  terms  were  too  harsh,  and  that 
many  ministers  would  not  comply,  Bishop  Sheldon,  who  stood 
by,  said  :  "I  am  afraid  that  they  will."  And  they  did  so,  and 
brought  a  muddy  stream  of  dishonest  Puritanism  into  the  Church. 
It  was  reckoned  that  at  this  time  fully  one-half  of  the  clergy  were 
out  of  sympathy  with  Church  doctrine  and  practice.  They 
3 


34 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


regarded  the  Church  as  an  Establishment  that  provided  them 
with  a  livelihood,  endured  the  Prayer  Book,  without  entertain- 
ing any  love  for  it,  and  were  not  scrupulous  to  obey  its  rubrics 
and  conform  to  its  spirit.  Referring  to  the  Act  of  Uniformity, 
Dr.  Allen  said  to  Sheldon  :  "  Tis  pity  the  door  is  so  strait." 
To  which  Sheldon  replied  :  "  'Tis  no  pity  at  all.  If  we  had 
thought  so  many  of  them  would  have  conformed  we  would  have 
made  it  strait er." 

The  Conformists  had  an  ingenious  method  of  salving  their 
consciences,  by  putting  up  vastly  long  extempore  prayers  before 
and  after  the  sermon,  hurrying  over  the  morning  and  evening 
prayers  at  a  gabble,  in  the  most  slighting  manner,  and  concentrat- 
ing the  whole  interest  of  the  congregation  on  their  own  effusions. 

These  were  called  "conceived  prayers,"  and  the  Conformist 
clergy  made  no  scruple  to  cut  down  a  good  deal  of  the  Liturgical 
Office,  so  as  to  give  scope  for  their  own  lucubrations.  One  in- 
cumbent in  the  diocese  of  Gloucester  had  the  audacity  to  excuse 
himself  to  Bishop  Frampton  for  so  curtailing  the  Office  prayers, 
on  the  plea  that  "  the  length  of  the  service  hindered  him  from 
praying  in  the  pulpit  as  long  as  he  would."  It  was  not  possible 
to  stop  this  practice,  to  which  the  old  Presbyterians  and  Inde- 
pendents were  greatly  addicted,  as  a  means  of  showing  them- 
selves off  to  great  advantage  to  their  audience  ;  and  the  bishops 
were  afraid  of  forbidding  it.  Even  so  late  as  1675,  a  published 
sermon  has  a  "  conceived  prayer  "  preceding  it,  four  pages  long. 

In  some  churches,  as  a  correspondent  complained  to  Dean 
Granville,  the  congregation  loitered  about  outside  the  church 
till  the  Liturgical  Office  had  been  said,  when  they  rushed  in  to 
hear  the  "  conceived  prayer." 

Churchmen,  like  Dean  Granville,  looked  upon  these  extem- 
pore prayers  as  marking  men  to  be  insincere  Conformists. 
Referring  to  the  Church  prayers,  they  would  say:  "We  have 
hitherto  prated,  but  now  let  us  pray,"  or  "  Brethren,  it  is  true  we 
have  been  praying  in  the  voice  of  the  Church,  but  now  we'll  pray 
better." 

Moreover,  as  during  the  time  of  the  domination  of  Puritanism 
the  Celebration  of  the  Lord's  Supper,  even  after  Presbyterian 
forms,  had  become  rare,  it  remained  rare  wherever  there  were 
Conformists,  and  they  allowed  Communicants  to  walk  up  to  the 
Holy  Table  and  receive  standing,  or  else  they  went  down  into 
the  body  of  the  church  and  communicated  the  people  in  their 
places. 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  35 


The  Test  Act  of  1673,  which  forced  Nonconformists  either  to 
abstain  from  seeking  any  public  office  or  to  become  occasional 
communicants  had  a  most  mischievous  effect.  They  came, 
but  persisted  in  standing  to  receive ;  and  Dr.  Hooke,  vicar  of 
Halifax,  was  thought  to  be  very  uncharitable  because  he  refused 
certificates  to  such  as  would  not  kneel ;  and  the  rule  requiring 
Communicants  to  kneel  was  generally  dispensed  with  by  clergy 
at  the  time. 

Another  point  on  which  the  Conformists  held  out  was  against 
the  Catechizing  of  Children  on  the  Sunday  afternoon.  It  inter- 
fered with,  or  supplanted  the  relished  sermon,  but  it  was  a  point 
strongly  insisted  on  by  the  Bishops.  For  one  thing  those  Con- 
formist clergy  did  not  like  the  plain  doctrine  contained  in  the 
Catechism  of  the  Church. 

The  Puritans  were  very  anxious  to  retain  the  Lecturers  as 
free  lances,  wherever  malcontents  could  be  found  in  a  parish 
who  would  put  their  hands  into  their  pockets  to  find  a  stipend 
for  them,  and  thus  keep  up  a  spirit  of  strife  and  dissent  wherever 
there  was  an  orthodox  pastor.  Baxter,  among  his  proposed 
terms  of  union  in  1673,  required  "  that  lecturers  should  not  be 
obliged  to  read  the  service,  or  at  most  that  it  be  enough  if  once 
in  half  a  year  they  read  the  greatest  part  of  what  is  appointed 
for  that  time."  I  have  already  mentioned  the  Act  that  was 
passed  to  put  them  under  some  sort  of  control. 

It  would  be  a  great  mistake  to  attribute  the  neglect  of  Church 
ordinances  to  the  Conformists  alone.  The  fault  lay  equally  with 
the  poor  quality  of  clergy  who  were  of  the  Church  throughout, 
or  had  been  recently  ordained.  Dean  Granville  writes,  1675  : 
"  As  for  the  observation  of  the  festivals  (wherein  an  especial 
part  of  our  religion  doth  consist)  they  are  notorious  prophan'd 
not  only  by  the  people,  but  scandalously  neglected,  or  slightly 
observed  (as  to  the  due  performance  of  God's  worship  in  them) 
by  the  Priest.  Ministers  begin,  I  see,  to  make  very  bold  with 
them,  and  for  little,  despicable,  temporal  convenience  change 
the  customary  hours  of  God's  worship  and  sometimes  wholly 
lay  it  aside,  at  least  in  the  afternoon,  and  sometimes  upon  no 
better  account  than  that  they  and  their  people  may  goe  to  a 
horse-race,  or  some  such  idle  sport  or  divertisement." 

The  Conformists  were  especially  bitter  against  those  Presby- 
terians and  Independents  who  did  not  conform.  They  thought 
and  hoped  that,  had  all  come  in,  they  would  have  been  enabled 
to  capture  the  English  Church.    Dean  Granville  wrote  in  1679  : 


36 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


"  And  of  all  non-conformists,  I  confesse  I  have  most  indignation 
against  those  that  can  accept  of  a  fat  benefice  and  preferment 
upon  pretence  of  conforming  and  giving  assent  and  consent  to 
our  order,  bitterly  inveighing  against  all  dissenters  from  our 
rule,  which  they  most  scandalously  neglect  and  contemne  them- 
selves, nay  sometimes  even  persecuting  well-meaning  though 
misguided  soules,  by  virtue  of  the  Common  Prayer  Book,  which 
they  themselves  will  not  observe,  nay  scarce  ever  consideringly 
read." 

In  his  Observations  on  the  Grievances  and  Abuses  in  the 
Church  of  England,  the  Dean  notes  first  of  all  "  that  the  Door  of 
Ordination  was  in  reality  made  too  wide,  not  so  much  by  our 
Church  as  by  our  Churchmen."  And  this  was  the  case.  So 
many  thousands  of  livings  had  to  be  filled,  that  the  Bishops 
and  patrons  accepted  almost  any  man  who  offered.  His  second 
grievance  was  that  the  clergy  neglected  the  rule  of  the  Common 
Prayer  Book  after  having  made  a  public  declaration  of  conformity 
in  the  Church  and  having  given  their  assent  and  consent  to  it.1 

Amidst  the  Dean's  correspondence  is  a* communication  from  a 
student  in  the  Inns  of  Court,  giving  an  account  of  the  irregularities 
in  the  performance  of  Divine  Service  by  the  clergy  of  London. 
Perhaps  one  of  the  most  curious  was  that  of  reading  the  Visitation 
of  the  Sick  in  church  instead  of  at  the  bedside  of  the  sick  man. 
In  Cumberland  and  Westmorland  there  had  been  twenty-eight 
ejected.  Of  these  some  because  they  were  intruders,  and  the 
old  incumbents  were  still  alive.  Calamy  and  Palmer  give  the 
number  of  ministers  ejected  in  Cumberland  as  thirty,  of  whom 
four  conformed  afterwards  ;  for  Westmorland  nine,  of  whom 
four  conformed.  "What  impresses  the  reader  is  the  eagerness 
of  the  number  of  those  who  accepted  the  new  ritualism  and  there- 
fore were  left  undisturbed."  2 

From  Ken's  Visitation  Articles,  issued  in  1684,  we  learn  that 
at  that  date,  in  the  diocese  of  Bath  and  Wells,  there  were  still 
churches  in  which  the  surplice  was  not  worn,  and  where  the 
altar  stood  without  cover  or  rail  in  the  nave,  where  there  was 
neither  chalice  nor  Prayer  Book.  In  1662  Archdeacon  Basire 
reported  of  Northumberland  that  "  in  many  churches  there  were 

1  Archdeacon  Granville's  Remains  are  most  interesting  reading,  and 
throw  a  great  light  on  the  condition  of  the  Church  of  the  Restoration. 
They  were  published  by  the  Surtees  Society,  1861,  1865. 

8  Nightingale  (B.),  The  Ejected  of  Cumberland  and  Westmorland  (Man- 
chester, 191 1 ).  The  number  28  is  taken  from  "  a  Great  Catalogue  of  the 
names  of  the  several  ministers  lately  ejected,"  1663,  in  Mr.  Nightingale's 
book,  p.  80. 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  37 


neither  Bibles,  Books  of  Common  Prayer,  surpasses,  fonts,  Com- 
munion Tables,  nor  anything  that  is  necessarie  for  the  service 
of  God."  In  1665  matters  were  not  much  better.  In  the  diocese 
of  Hereford  in  1675  Bishop  Croft  did  not  think  it  "  wise  to  be 
zealous  for  the  surplice." 

Dean  Granville  complained  of  his  curate  at  Kilkhampton 
in  Cornwall  "  officiating  without  the  surplice  to  please  the  dow- 
baked  people  of  that  country." 

Archdeacon  (afterwards  Dean)  Granville,  in  his  Visitation 
charge,  1674,  says  :  "  I  have  look'don  it  as  (a)  very  fatall  presage 
since  the  restoracion  of  our  Church  service  that  the  Cleargy  have 
expressed  noe  more  affection  to  it."  No  wonder,  when  the 
majority  were  Conformists.  He  urged  again  and  again  :  "  Be- 
sides the  ordinary  offices  for  Sundayes  and  Feastivalls  and  dayly 
prayers  throughout  the  yeare,  there  should  be  a  conscientious 
discharge  of  the  duties  of  Catechizing,  Exposition,  Visitation  of 
the  Sick,  personal  application,  sermons  on  all  festivals."  Never- 
theless "  the  Dayly  Prayers  in  joined  to  be  said  in  all  Parish 
Churches,  are  not  observ'd  in  more  than  four  places  throughout 
the  whole  Diocese.  Catechizing  enjoin' d  on  all  Sundays  and 
Holy  Days  is  restrained  by  most  only  to  Lent." 

On  the  other  hand  there  was  much  earnestness  manifest 
among  High  Churchmen  to  rebuild  the  waste  places  of  Zion,  and 
to  restore  the  solemnities  of  Divine  worship.  Wherever  there 
were  clergy  of  the  old  school  "  the  full  system  of  the  Church  was 
at  once  restored,  even  before  the  Act  of  Uniformity  was  passed. 
Surplices  reappeared  in  church,  the  clergy  once  more  walked 
about  the  street  in  gown  and  cassock  and  square  cap.  The 
altars  were  moved  to  the  East  end  of  the  chancel  and  railed  in. 
The  cathedrals  were  purified  from  the  state  of  neglect  in  which 
they  had  lain  during  the  Commonwealth.  The  walls  were 
repaired,  the  signs  of  wanton  destruction  and  desecration  as  far 
as  possible  removed,  and  the  choirs  once  more  resounded  daily 
to  the  tones  of  the  organs  and  the  voices  of  the  choristers.  At 
Durham  the  copes  were  worn,  and  the  candles  lighted ;  at  Ely 
incense  was  burned  at  the  celebration  of  the  Holy  Eucharist."  1 

Pepys  entered  in  his  diary : 

"  1660.  8  July  (Lord's  Day)—  To  White  Hall  chapel.  Here 
I  heard  very  good  musique,  the  first  time  that  ever  I  remember 
to  have  heard  the  organs  and  singing  men  in  surplices  in  my 
life. 

1  Wakeman,  History  of  the  Church  of  England  (1904),  p.  404. 


38 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


"  1660.  24  July  (Lord's  Day). — To  White  Hall  chapel,  where 
I  heard  a  cold  sermon,  and  the  ceremonies  did  not  please  me, 
they  do  so  overdo  them. 

"  1661.  17  Nov.  (Lord's  Day). — To  Church  and  heard  a 
simple  fellow  upon  the  praise  of  church  musique,  and  exclaiming 
against  men  wearing  hats  in  church. 

"18  Nov. — At  S.  Paul's,  where  I  saw  the  quiristers  in  their 
surplices  going  to  prayers,  and  a  few  idle  people  and  boys  to  hear 
them,  which  is  the  first  time  I  see  them,  and  am  sorry  to  see 
things  done  so  out  of  order." 

Notwithstanding  the  amount  of  Puritanism  that  had  been 
imported  into  the  Church  through  the  Conformists,  under  the 
energetic  rule  of  the  Caroline  Bishops  the  standard  of  Faith  and 
practice  that  had  been  set  up  by  the  great  divines  under  James  I 
and  Charles  I  was  being  rapidly  recovered.  A  good  many  of 
those  who  belonged  to  the  first  period  lived  to  a  great  age  and 
were  able  to  help  in  the  reconstruction  of  the  Church  after 
the  Restoration  ;  and  few  things  are  more  remarkable  than 
the  rise  and  expansion  of  Church  feeling,  and  growth  of  public 
worship  in  the  reign  of  Queen  Anne.  Out  of  such  unpromising 
material  good  had  come.  The  levelling  up  was  in  full  pro- 
gress when,  with  the  Revolution,  and  the  arrival  of  William  of 
Orange,  the  Church  suffered  severely.  Indeed  he  put  a  check 
on  her  recovery. 

William  was  a  Dutch  Calvinist  of  strong  anti-Catholic  pre- 
judices. He  showed  his  disregard  for  Church  feeling  by  having 
himself  proclaimed  on  Ash  Wednesday,  a  day  then  observed 
with  greater  strictness  than  in  later  times.  Old-fashioned 
Churchmen  were  offended  at  seeing  bonfires  blazing,  wine-casks 
broached  in  the  streets,  processions  marshalled,  banquets  spread, 
and  at  hearing  the  church  bells  ringing  merry  peals  on  the 
first  day  of  the  Lenten  fast.  William  ostentatiously  kept  his 
hat  on  in  church,  as  he  had  been  wont  to  do  in  the  Calvinistic 
tabernacles  at  home,  and  obsequious  courtiers  did  the  same. 
His  wife,  Mary,  had  been  brought  up  as  a  Churchwoman,  and 
had  imported  to  The  Hague,  Ken  and  Hooper  as  her  chaplains, 
men  of  definite  Church  opinions,  who  afterwards  became  succes- 
sively Bishops  of  Bath  and  Wells.  William  entertained  a  dis- 
like for  them,  and  declared  that,  should  he  ever  obtain  the  crown 
of  England,  he  would  never  promote  such  men  as  these. 

After  the  Revolution  he  had  Gilbert  Burnet  as  his  chief  ad- 
viser in  Church  matters,  a  man  who  had  been  brought  up  as  a 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH 


39 


Scottish  Presbyterian,  and  who  in  Holland  had  assiduously 
attended  Calvinistic  worship,  and  even  communicated  in  the 
Dutch  conventicles.  He  had  been  ordained  in  the  Church,  but 
his  sympathies  and  prejudices  were  those  that  he  had  acquired 
in  early  days.  John  Tillotson  was  the  son  of  a  Yorkshire  clothier, 
a  Presbyterian,  and  his  intimate  friends  had  been  Socinians, 
Quakers  and  Puritans.  At  the  Restoration  he  had  been  ejected 
from  his  fellowship  at  Clare,  Cambridge,  on  account  of  his  Puritan- 
ism. But  he  became  a  Conformist,  and  had  been  made  Dean 
of  Canterbury,  then  raised  by  William  to  be  Archbishop  and 
Primate  of  all  England.  He  never  shook  off  his  Puritanical 
principles,  and  was  largely  credited  with  being  a  Socinian  at 
heart.  He  had  no  affection  for  the  Creed  of  the  Church,  and 
despised  its  ritual,  which  he  disregarded.  Wherever  he  could, 
he  acted  as  a  Dissenter  rather  than  as  a  Churchman.  He  was 
wont  to  administer  the  Eucharist  to  persons  sitting  instead  of 
kneeling.  He  would  saunter  up  and  down  in  the  church  carrying 
the  Sacred  Elements,  and  administer  first  to  those  lounging  in 
their  pews,  and  then  to  those  kneeling  at  the  rails  ;  he  would 
not  himself  go  within,  but  standing  without,  forced  the  Com- 
municants to  turn  about  so  as  to  receive.  That  King  William 
should  have  offered  such  a  man  the  Archbishopric  is  what  we  can 
well  understand,  better  than  we  can  the  dishonesty  of  Tillotson 
in  accepting  it. 

Henry  Compton  was  already  Bishop  of  London — a  man  after 
the  King's  own  heart,  as  he  was  thoroughly  Latitudinarian.  He 
was  an  ex-cornet  of  the  Royal  Horse  Guards,  and  as  ignorant  of 
theology  and  of  Church  principles  as  a  soldier  might  be.  On 
December  3,  1689,  when  William  of  Orange  entered  London, 
he,  the  Bishop  of  London,  to  the  scandal  of  Churchmen,  drew 
on  top-boots,  put  his  rapier  by  his  side,  slung  pistols  in  his  belt, 
and  throwing  a  purple  cloak  over  Ins  shoulders,  rode,  thus 
accoutred,  to  meet  William.  Ever  afterwards  he  bore  the  nick- 
name of  u  Jack  Boots."  Stillingrleet,  whose  Irenicon  was  the 
text-book  of  those  who  denied  Episcopacy,  or  any  form  of  ministry 
to  be  of  Divine  appointment,  was  made  Bishop  of  Worcester. 

Tenison  was  another  Latitudinarian  on  whom  William  could 
reckon.  He  had  been  made  Bishop  of  Lincoln  in  1692,  and  on 
the  death  of  Tillotson  was  raised  to  the  Primacy.  He  valued 
the  Church  as  a  political  institution,  and  had  no  regard  for  it  as  a 
Spiritual  society.  He  hated  Convocation  as  truly  as  did  Tillot- 
son, as  a  manifestation  of  life  in  the  Church,  and  he  advised  the 


40 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


King  not  to  call  it  together,  but  to  govern  the  Church  by  Royal 
Injunctions;  and  this  William  did.  "It  certainly  seems 
ludicrous,"  says  Mr.  Hore,  "  that  an  Anglicized  Dutchman  who 
was  in  his  heart  a  Calvinist  and  a  Presbyterian,  should  be  re- 
quested by  an  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  to  teach  the  Bishops 
their  duty." 

As  the  opinion  prevailed  that  the  clergy  generally  were  Jaco- 
bite in  feeling,  the  unprecedented  step  was  taken  of  enforcing 
on  them  an  oath  of  allegiance  to  William  and  Mary.  Eight 
bishops  and  about  four  hundred  clergy  refused  the  oath,  and 
were  deprived.  Hereby  a  large  opening  was  made  for  the  ad- 
vancement of  men  of  Low  Church  and  Latitudinarian  views. 

In  the  first  two  years  of  the  reign  of  William  and  Mary  as 
many  as  fifteen  bishops  were  appointed.  Burnet  obtained  the 
Bishopric  of  Salisbury,  and  Tillotson,  the  ex- Presbyterian,  was 
elevated  to  the  throne  of  S.  Augustine  and  Laud.  Before  the 
end  of  the  reign,  the  Episcopal  bench  was  packed  with  prelates 
who  were  Latitudinarians,  men  of  no  Church  principles,  ready 
to  take  direction  from  a  prince  who  was  an  adulterer,  and 
a  foreigner,  and  not  a  member  of  the  Church,  and  were  willing 
to  carry  out  William's  favourite  device  of  broadening  the  basis 
of  the  English  Church  so  as  to  take  in  all  Dissenters. 

In  1689  a  Bill  was  passed  through  both  Houses  appointing  a 
Commission  to  examine  into  the  means  to  be  adopted  to  effect 
this  purpose,  by  revising  the  Liturgy,  the  Canons,  and  the  Eccle- 
siastical Courts.  It  met  in  October  1689,  and  proposed  to  undo 
everything  that  had  been  done  by  the  Convocation  of  1661  ; 
to  forbid  the  chanting  of  the  Psalms,  even  in  cathedrals ;  the 
observance  of  Saints'  Days,  the  cross  in  Baptism,  the  appoint- 
ment of  godparents,  all  these  were  to  be  abolished.  The  wearing 
of  the  surplice  was  to  be  made  optional.  The  form  of  Absolu- 
tion was  to  be  modified.  Episcopal  ordination  was  not  to  be 
required  for  the  ministry  ;  kneeling  to  receive  the  Communion 
was  to  be  optional,  and  the  Collects,  as  too  concise,  were  to 
be  puffed  out  with  rhetorical  bombast.  Convocation  met  on 
November  20  to  consider  the  proposals  of  the  Commission.  It 
soon  became  apparent  that  the  Lower  House  was  opposed  to 
any  alteration  in  the  Prayer  Book  and  in  the  constitution  of  the 
Church.  The  Prolocutor,  addressing  Compton,  Bishop  of  London, 
who  was  in  the  chair,  eulogized  the  Church  in  England  as  main- 
taining the  Faith  once  for  all  delivered  to  the  saints,  and  as 
preserving  the  marks  of  the  Catholic  Church  throughout  all 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  41 


ages.  He  plainly  intimated  that  no  alteration  and  watering 
down  would  be  tolerated  by  the  clergy.  He  concluded  with  the 
significant  words  "  Nolumus  leges  Anglic?  mutari."  The  King, 
Burnet,  Tillotson,  Compton  and  other  Latitudinarians  speedily 
became  aware  that  the  Lower  House  was  not  to  be  hectored  or 
cajoled  into  submission  to  the  King  and  his  obsequious  bishops. 

William,  disappointed  and  offended,  prorogued  Convocation 
for  six  weeks,  and  when  these  six  weeks  were  over,  seeing  no 
chance  of  getting  his  way,  prorogued  it  again  indefinitely. 

The  Convocation  of  1689  saved  the  Church  of  England  from 
devolution  into  a  formless,  colourless,  invertebrate  lump.  After 
this  failure  to  broaden  the  basis  of  the  Established  Church,  all 
the  Latitudinarians  could  do — and  they  laid  themselves  out  to 
do  it — was  to  encourage  laxity  in  ceremonial  and  discipline.  We 
have  already  noted  how  that  Tillotson  defied  rubrical  order 
in  the  administration  of  Communion.  Unable  to  get  the  Prayer 
Book  altered,  and  angry  at  the  opposition  of  the  clergy,  he 
and  the  rest  were  in  no  mood  to  insist  on  the  due  observance 
of  rules  which  they  neither  obeyed  themselves  nor  wanted  to 
see  obeyed  by  others,  and  which  they  desired  to  see  expunged 
out  of  the  Liturgy.  The  parochial  clergy  manfully  resisted  for 
a  while.  But  the  dead  weight  of  unsympathetic  Bishops  bowed 
them  down,  and  in  the  end  they  also  ceased  to  observe  the  rubrics 
and  rules  of  the  Church,  when  they  found  that  in  the  eyes  of 
their  diocesans  such  as  did  were  regarded  as  unsuitable  for 
preferment,  and  the  most  lax  came  in  for  smiles  from  statesmen 
and  Bishops  alike. 

An  example  of  the  subserviency  of  the  bishops  appointed 
under  William  and  Mary  was  afforded  at  the  execution  of  Sir 
John  Friend  and  Sir  William  Parkyns  in  1696,  for  high  treason. 
The  two  knights  were  attended  on  the  scaffold  by  three  non- 
juring  clergy,  Jeremy  Collier,  Cook,  and  Snatt.  Before  the  hang- 
man adjusted  the  halter,  the  dying  men  knelt,  and  the  three 
priests  laid  their  hands  upon  their  heads,  and  Collier  pronounced 
the  Absolution,  to  which  the  other  two  responded  Amen.  For 
this  Cook  and  Snatt  were  flung  into  prison,  and  Collier  only 
escaped  by  concealing  himself. 

Thereupon  the  two  Archbishops  and  twelve  Bishops  issued 
a  manifesto  denouncing  these  priests,  on  the  wretched  plea  that 
the  form  of  absolution  prescribed  in  the  Prayer  Book  was  only 
to  be  employed  in  the  visitation  of  sick  people.1 

1  Secret  History  of  Europe  (1715),  iv.  p.  241  et  seq. 


42 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


It  has  been  asked,  whence  did  William  obtain  the  bishops 
whom  he  advanced  to  the  vacant  sees,  so  devoid  of  principle 
as  to  use  their  utmost  powers  to  subvert  the  Church  ?  He  found 
them  among  the  Conformists.  Too  many  of  the  old  Presby- 
terians, as  we  have  seen,  had  been  bribed  to  join  the  Church  by 
offers  of  mitres  and  decanal  stalls,  in  the  reign  of  Charles  II, 
and  there  were  others  who  had  conformed  simply  so  as  to  be  in 
a  position  to  look  out  for  preferment.  No  man  can  betray  his 
conscience  for  filthy  lucre  and  not  be  morally  degraded  thereby. 
Such  were  these  men.  The  sin  of  Jeroboam  was  that  he  made 
priests  of  the  lowest  of  the  people.  William  incurred  the  same 
condemnation,  not  that  his  prelates  were  of  low  birth,  or  were 
ignorant  men,  but  because  of  their  moral  baseness. 

At  the  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes,  by  Louis  XIV  in 
1685,  the  French  Huguenots  came  over  to  England  in  troops. 
But  even  prior  to  that  date  the  French  Calvinists  had  swarmed 
across  the  Channel  and  had  set  up  their  conventicles  in  Canter- 
bury, Canvey  Island,  Colchester,  Dover,  Faversham,  Glaston- 
bury, Ipswich,  Maidstone,  Norwich,  Rye,  Sandtoft,  Sandwich, 
Southampton,  Stamford,  Thetford,  Thorne  Abbey,  Whittlesea, 
Winchester,  Yarmouth ;  in  and  after  1685  at  Barnstaple,  Bide- 
ford,  Bristol,  Chelsea,  Dartmouth,  Exeter,  Greenwich,  Hammer- 
smith, Plymouth,  Stonehouse,  and  Thorpe.  In  a  few  months 
in  1688  fifty  thousand  families  left  France  for  ever,  and  many 
of  them  came  and  settled  in  England. 

But  earlier,  in  1620,  there  was  a  French  church  in  London, 
and  Pepys  sometimes  attended  it.  After  1621,  in  it  was  used 
the  English  Church  Liturgy  translated,  and  Pepys  noticed  that 
the  pastor  preached  and  prayed  with  his  hat  off.  A  royal  bounty 
was  accorded  to  the  refugees,  consisting  of  money  raised  through- 
out the  Kingdom,  large  sums  were  subscribed  for  them  in  1681, 
and  in  the  two  or  three  ensuing  years.  In  1686  another  collection 
was  made,  and  something  like  £40,000  was  raised. 

A  Bill  for  the  Naturalization  of  Foreign  Protestants  was 
brought  into  the  House  of  Commons  on  February  14,  1709, 
and  passed  on  March  23.  Elie  Bouherau,  son  of  a  pastor  at 
La  Rochelle,  was  made  Chanter  and  Librarian  of  S.  Patrick's 
Cathedral,  Dublin  ;  he  founded  the  family  of  Borough,  Baronets. 
Titles  were  lavished  on  these  refugees,  and  livings  and  prebendal 
stalls  on  such  Calvinist  ministers  as  would  swallow  their  scruples 
and  submit  to  ordination.  Daniel  Lombard,  who  could  scarce 
speak  a  word  of  English,  was  given  the  rectories  of  Lanteglos 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  43 


and  Advent  in  Cornwall,  the  former  including  the  market  town 
of  Camelford.  Jacques  Abbadie  was  made  Dean  of  Killaloe, 
and  not  thinking  himself  sufficiently  repaid  for  his  abandonment 
of  his  cure  in  France,  clamoured  for  the  deanery  of  S.  Patrick's. 
Jacques  Pineton  was  given  a  canonry  at  Windsor.  James 
Peter,  son  of  the  refugee  Jacques  Auriol,  was  the  father  of  Edward 
Auriol,  Rector  of  S.  Dunstan  in  the  West  and  Prebendary  of 
S.  Paul's.  Thomas  Roger,  son  of  the  refugee  Gabriel  de  Quesne, 
got  the  vicarage  of  East  Tuddenham,  and  was  made  Prebendary 
of  Ely.  Peter  Allix  was  a  Huguenot  pastor  and  the  son  of  a 
pastor.  When  he  came  to  England  he  submitted  to  ordination. 
Woodrow  wrote  :  "  Mr.  Webster  tells  me  that  .  .  .  Monsieur 
Allix  was  the  first  [of  the  pastors]  who  submitted  to  reordination 
in  England,  and  that  he  was  so  choaked  (shocked)  when  he  saw 
M.  Allix  reordained  .  .  .  that  he  could  not  bear  it,  but  came  to 
Scotland."  Allix's  son,  Peter,  became  incumbent  of  Castle 
Camps  in  Cambridgeshire,  Dean  of  Gloucester,  and  next  Dean 
of  Ely.  De  la  Roche  wrote  :  "A  clergyman  well  acquainted 
with  Isaac  Vossius  told  me  that  one  day  he  asked  that  Prebendary 
of  Windsor1  what  was  become  of  a  certain  person.  He  has 
taken  Orders,"  replied  Vossius;  "he  has  got  a  living  in  the 
country,  sacrificulus  decipit  popalum" 

The  son  of  Josias  de  Champagne  was  granted  the  deanery  of 
Clonmacnois,  a  grandson  was  made  Rector  of  Twickenham  and 
Canon  of  Windsor  ;  Guillaume  Portal  received  the  rectory  of 
Fambridge,  Essex,  and  Clowne  in  Derby.  Charles  Daubuz  was 
given  the  vicarage  of  Tenterden,  the  rectory  of  Shargate,  and 
the  living  of  Goodmestone  ;  and  his  son  the  rectories  of  Danbury 
and  Woodhamferries,  and  after  the  death  of  his  father  also 
Goodmestone.  Pierre  Drelincourt  was  accorded  the  arch- 
deaconry of  Leighton  and  the  deanery  of  Armagh.  Jean  Armand 
de  Bourdieu  was  made  snug  in  the  rectory  of  Sawtry  All  Saints. 
Jacques  Sartres  became  prebendary  of  Westminster.  Daniel 
Armand  got  the  rectory  of  Holdenby  and  a  canonry  in  Peter- 
borough Cathedral.  Antoine  Ligonier,  a  pastor,  was  appointed 
military  chaplain.  Theophile  Louis  Barbaud  was  granted  the 
rectory  of  S.  Vedast,  London.  The  son  of  Bernard  Majendie, 
a  Calvinist  pastor,  had  a  son  who  was  put  into  a  canonry  at 
Worcester.    James  Saurin,  a  descendant  of  the  Huguenot 

1  He  was  a  Dutchman.  He  died  in  1689.  "  A  strange  scholar,"  said 
Charles  II  of  him.  "  He  believes  everything  but  the  Bible."  "  II  mourut 
a  soixante  et  onze  ans,  n'ayant  fait  paraitre  aucun  sentiment  de  piete." 
Biog.  Universelle. 


44 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


refugee  of  the  same  name,  was  made  Bishop  of  Dromore  in 
1819.  Daniel  Letabli&re,  Dean  of  Tuam,  Vicar  of  Laragh,  and 
Prebendary  of  Maynooth,  was  the  son  of  a  refugee,  Rene*  de 
Lestables.  Archdeacon  Fleury  of  Waterford,  Prebendary  of 
Kilgobenet,  was  descended  from  the  pastor  Louis  Fleury  of 
Tours.  Daniel  Augustus  Beaufort,  Archdeacon  of  Tuam,  was 
son  of  a  French  pastor.  Archdeacon  Jortin  was  son  of  Rene 
Jortin,  a  refugee  ;  beside  the  archdeaconry  of  London  he  received 
the  rectory  of  Kensington.  Richard  Chenevix,  of  another 
refugee  family,  was  given  the  bishoprics  of  Waterford  and  Lis- 
more.  A  Trenche  was  made  Archbishop  of  Tuam.  I  might 
multiply  instances.  Not  only  was  the  ministry  of  the  Church 
invaded  by  Calvinist  pastors,  but  the  Huguenot  refugees  and 
their  families  married  into  English  families,  carrying  with  them 
and  leavening  the  country  with  their  Huguenot  convictions. 
Many  of  the  refugees  became  merchant  princes.  In  1744  the 
merchants  of  the  City  of  London  presented  a  loyal  address  to 
the  King  in  consequence  of  His  Majesty's  message  to  the  Houses 
of  Parliament  "  regarding  designs  in  favour  of  a  Popish  pretender 
to  disturb  the  peace  and  quiet  of  your  Majesty's  kingdom." 
Among  the  542  signatures  are  94  French  names,  chiefly  Hugue- 
not. Several  of  the  refugees  were  ennobled.  The  Marquis  de 
Rouvigny  was  created  Earl  of  Galway  by  William  III.  Jean 
Louis  Ligonier  was  raised  to  the  peerage  as  Viscount  Ligonier 
of  Enniskillen  in  1757.  Edward  Ligonier  was  created  Earl 
Ligonier  in  1776.  Earl  Clancarty  is  a  Trench  descended 
from  the  Huguenot  family  of  Trenche.  The  Earl  of  Radnor 
is  a  Bouverie,  whose  ancestor  was  Laurent  des  Bouveries,  a 
silk-manufacturer,  who  fled  to  England  from  French  Flanders. 
In  1689  was  naturalized  Count  Schomberg,  whom  William  III 
at  once  elevated  to  the  English  peerage  with  the  titles  of  Baron  of 
Teyes,  Earl  of  Brentford,  Marquess  of  Harwich  and  Duke  of 
Schomberg.  His  son  Charles,  naturalized  in  1691,  was  created 
Duke  of  Leinster. 

Frederick  William  de  Roy,  naturalized  in  1694,  was  created 
Earl  of  Lifford.  Armand  de  Liremont  was  given  the  title  of 
Earl  of  Faversham  by  Charles  II.  George  Rene,  son  of  the 
pastor  Aufere,  had  one  child,  Sophia,  the  ancestress  of  the  Earls 
of  Yarbo rough.  A  Trenche  was  created  Lord  Ashtown.  I 
need  not  give  the  names  of  the  baronets  and  county  families 
that  come  of  the  refugees.  Sufficient  is  it  to  say  that  both  the 
aristocracy  and  the  burgess  class  have  had  infused  into  them  a 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  45 


torrent  of  Huguenot  blood,  carrying  with  it  hatred  of  Catholicism 
and  a  love  of  Calvinism.1 

Taking  the  clergy  of  the  present  day,  there  are  under  the 
letter  B  such  names  as  these  :  Backert,  Ballard,  Balleine,  Baring, 
Baumann,  Baumer,  Baumgarten,  Beaghen,  Becker,  Bellamy, 
Bennertz,  Benoit,  Benoy,  Bergemann,  Berger,  Bergheim,  Ber- 
nays,  Bienemann,  Biron,  Bischoff,  Bleiben,  Blumhardt,  Boehm, 
Boissier,  Bonney,  Bosanquet  (six  of  these),  Boudier,  Bouquet, 
Bourdillon  (three  of  these),  Boutflower,  Bouverie,  Bozman, 
Breguet,  Brinckmann,  Buee,  Buer,  Busch,  But  chart,  all  French 
or  German  names.  Of  the  Des  (Mullins  is  actually  De  Moleyns) 
there  are  d'Auvergne,  d'Easun,  Death  (de  Ath),  de  Ballinhard, 
de  Bary,  de  Beauvais,  de  Berends,  de  Boinville,  de  Bourbel, 
de  Brisnay,  de  Candole,  de  Cas,  de  Castro,  de  Ceriat,  de  Cetto, 
de  Chair,  de  Coetlogon,  de  Courcelles,  de  Gruchy,  de  Gu6rin, 
de  Labat,  de  Labilliere,  de  la  Hay,  de  la  Pryme,  de  la  Rosa,  de 
Matter,  de  Mel,  de  Paravicini,  de  Pencier,  de  Putron,  de  Quette- 
ville,  de  Renzi,  de  Romestin,  de  Rougemont,  de  Sainte  Croix, 
de  Salis,  des  Barres,  de  Silva,  de  Smedt,  des  Quartiers,  de 
Spaillier,  de  Trevelec,  de  Vine,  de  Wolf,  de  Wit,  du  Boe,  du 
Boulay  (six  of  these).  Some  are  from  the  Channel  Islands, 
descendants  of  Huguenots  settled  there. 

If  under  two  letters  we  find  such  an  influx  of  foreigners  or 
descendants  of  foreigners,  conceive  what  an  inundation  there 
must  be  discovered  to  exist  if  we  take  the  trouble  of  going 
through  the  entire  clergy  list ! 

But  this  does  not  exhaust  them,  for  great  numbers  of 
such  as  were  naturalized  had  names  so  similar  to  those 
of  Englishmen  that  it  is  impossible  to  distinguish  their  sons 
and  descendants  from  native  Englishmen.  Thus  Fletcher  of 
Madeley  was  a  Swiss  De  la  Flechere.  In  addition  to  this 
many  of  these  Huguenots  who  were  naturalized  deliberately 
shed  their  French  appellations  and  adopted  genuine  English 
names. 

Such  names  as  these  that  follow  would  at  once  disappear 
as  distinctive  :  Hain  (becoming  Hayne),  Vincent,  Amory,  Aubry, 
Benet,  Bernard,  Bourn,  Chamberlain,  Carpentier  (becoming 
Carpenter),  Chape  11,  Combe,  Clement,  Crispin,  David,  Dufay 
(becoming  Duffey),  Farman,  Gaude,  Gervaise,  Gilbert,  Godfrey, 
Gouffe  (becoming  Goffe,  or  Gough),  Heron,  Huet  (now  Hewett), 
Hayes,  Lambert,  Michael,  Martin,  Mariot,  Marchant,  Porch, 
1  On  one  day,  July  3,  1701,  as  many  as  303  were  naturalized. 


46 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Robert,  Roger,  Ta vernier,  Tournour  (now  Turner),  Vivian  and 
Vincent. 

Then  again  several  of  these  refugees  deliberately  adopted 
English  names — as  Taphorse,  Collier,  Percy,  More,  Nisbet,  Xiel, 
Ogilby,  Paulet,  Paget.  In  1687  we  find  Page,  Smith,  King, 
Lee  and  Wildgoose  ;  and  in  1688  Boyd,  Cooke,  Pratt  and  Pain 
(becoming  Payne).  I  have  not  extracted  a  tithe  of  those  who 
almost  at  once  formed  families  that  could  not  be  distinguished 
by  their  names  from  such  as  were  genuinely  English.  And, 
unquestionably,  there  are  a  large  number  of  these  of  Huguenot 
origin,  not  recognizable  as  such,  to  be  found  in  the  Clergy  List. 

The  Channel  Islands  were  a  harbour  of  Calvinism,  that  sent 
its  emissaries  into  England.  At  the  instigation  of  Sir  Thomas 
Leighton  and  Sir  Amyas  Paulet,  Governor  of  Guernsey  and 
Jersey  in  1558,  Queen  Elizabeth  permitted  them  to  set  up 
Genevan  discipline  in  the  islands,  though  politically  attached 
to  the  diocese  of  Winchester,  and  the  "  Church  "  there  was  put 
practically  in  communion  with  the  French  Huguenots.  No 
English  bishop  set  foot  in  the  islands  since  the  transfer  in  Eliza- 
beth's reign  from  the  French  diocese  of  Coutance  to  the  English 
one  of  Winchester,  till  they  were  visited  in  1818  by  Bishop 
Fisher  of  Salisbury.  I  was  several  times  in  the  islands  between 
1847  and  1 85 1,  and  they  positively  reeked  of  Geneva.  The 
clergy  were  indeed  ordained,  but  were  very  much  a  law  to  them- 
selves, and  the  services  in  the  churches  appeared  to  me — even 
in  those  my  young  days — intolerably  repulsive.  And  there  was 
always  a  setting  in  of  clergy  from  the  islands  to  England,  bringing 
contamination  with  them. 

Two  centuries  ago  there  existed  in  Soho  and  its  neighbour- 
hood as  many  as  twelve  chapels  for  the  convenience  of  French 
Huguenots,  Swiss  and  Dutch  Calvinists.  All  are  now  gone — 
but  the  descendants  of  these  foreigners  have  been  absorbed  into 
the  mass  of  the  English  people.  It  was  inevitable  that  Cal- 
vinism should  saturate  and  sour  the  soil  that  absorbed  it. 
In  most  places  these  refugees  conformed  to  the  Church,  so  far 
as  going  to  the  services  can  be  called  conformity,  but  their 
hearts  were  far  from  the  Catholic  faith. 

There  is  a  certain  diseased  condition  of  the  blood — which 
affects  a  man  till  he  dies,  and  also  pursues  his  descendants  from 
generation  to  generation.  It  does  more — it  is  infectious  and 
contagious.  And  such  was  Calvinism.  It  transformed,  made 
infirm,  the  fair  Church  of  England.    The  Huguenot  immigrants 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  47 


speedily  accommodated  themselves  to  making  way  in  the  Estab- 
lished Church  by  impregnating  it  with  their  Calvinism,  and  in 
time  transformed  its  outward  appearance. 

"  I  know  that  Deformed,"  said  the  watchman  in  Much  Ado 
about  Nothing ;  "  a  wears  a  lock."  And  the  Dogberries  and  their 
like  knew  the  English  Church  in  the  early  Victorian  period  only 
in  its  deformed  condition,  its  mouth  padlocked  by  the  State, 
disfigured  and  silent. 

As  if  it  were  not  enough  to  be  invaded  directly  from  France 
by  Huguenots,  the  refugees  in  Switzerland  presented  a  petition 
in  1712  to  Queen  Anne,  to  be  taken  under  her  royal  and  gracious 
protection,  beseeching  her  to  obtain  for  them  the  restitution  of 
their  properties  and  privileges  in  France.  The  petition,  we  are 
informed,  was  most  graciously  received,  and  promises  were  held 
out  to  them — which,  however,  were  not  carried  out.  Finding 
that  the  Treaty  of  Utrecht  did  not  give  them  back  what  they 
wanted,  and  the  Swiss  not  caring  to  be  burdened  with  too  many 
of  them,  a  number  of  these  refugees  made  their  way  down  the 
Rhine  and  into  England. 

The  Laboucheres  were  a  Huguenot  family  settled  in  Holland. 
Pierre  Cesar  became  a  clerk  in  the  House  of  Hope  of  Amsterdam. 
He  was  sent  over  to  England  during  the  troubles  of  the  Revolu- 
tion to  settle  some  business  with  the  House  of  Baring.  He  fell 
in  love  with  Dorothy,  daughter  of  Sir  Francis  Baring,  and  pro- 
posed. The  Baronet  rejected  him  with  scorn.  "  But  how," 
he  asked,  "  if  I  be  a  partner  in  the  House  of  Hope  ?  "  "In  that 
case,"  said  Sir  Francis,  "the  case  would  be  altered."  Pierre 
Cesar  swept  back  to  Amsterdam,  and  demanded  that  he  should 
be  taken  into  partnership.  This  was  indignantly  refused. 
"  But,"  he  said,  "  how  if  I  am  son-in-law  to  Sir  Francis  Baring  ?  " 
"  In  that  case,  it  is  different."  So,  at  one  stroke  he  became 
partner  of  the  House  of  Hope,  and  was  received  into  the  Baring 
family.  Pierre  Cesar  and  his  firm  worked  hand  in  hand  with  the 
Barings  all  through  the  Great  War,  when  they  stood  at  the  head 
of  European  finance.  He  came  to  England  in  1816,  retired 
from  business,  enormously  wealthy,  and  his  son,  Henry,  was 
created  Lord  Taunton,  and  became  leader  of  the  Evangelical 
party — of  course  he  did,  for  the  virus  of  Calvinism  ran  in  his 
veins. 

Further,  when  Louis  XIV  devastated  the  Palatinate,  swarms 
of  the  inhabitants  came  to  England — Calvinists  to  a  man — and 
were  most  graciously  received  and  patronized  by  the  Queen, 


48 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


the  nobility  and  the  citizens  of  London.  They  were  settled 
about  in  divers  places.  Something  like  6,544  persons  arrived  in 
the  Thames  from  the  Palatinate  in  1708 — not  a  great  number, 
but  helping  to  swell  the  torrent  of  Calvinism  that  was  drenching 
England.  But,  as  if  this  did  not  suffice,  from  beyond  the  Tweed 
came  hordes  of  Scots,  perfectly  ready  to  pocket  their  prejudices 
sufficiently  to  qualify  them  to  settle  down  on  English  Church 
pastures.  It  had  been,  and  continued  to  be,  like  the  army  of 
locusts  described  by  the  prophet.  But  with  the  Church  there 
had  not  been  one  invasion  only,  but  many,  one  succeeding 
another.  The  N.B.R.  pierced  the  wall  of  Severus,  and  a  legion 
of  needy  Scots  rushed  through  the  gap  without  return  tickets — 
the  N.B.R.  till  comparatively  recently,  if  it  does  now,  issued 
none  from  Edinburgh  to  London  and  back — upon  the  fertile 
South  with  huge  appetites,  red  heads,  empty  pockets  and  high 
cheek-bones.  Everything  was  grist  to  the  Caledonian  mill. 
The  invading  Scots  carried  off  whatever  they  could  lay  their 
hands  on.  Nothing  was  beyond  their  reach — a  Premiership, 
a  Chancellorship,  an  Archbishopric,  a  royal  Princess. 

We  have  but  to  look  to  our  own  day.  At  the  present  date 
both  our  Archbishops  are  Scotchmen,  and  their  predecessors  Tait 
and  Maclagan  were  also  of  that  nationality.  When  Archibald 
Tait  became  Archbishop,  some  lines  circulated  : 

Archie  was  a  Scotchman,  Archie  was  discreet, 

Archie  came  to  England  and  got  the  Primate's  seat. 

I  went  to  Archie's  land,  Archie  was  from  home  : 

Odd  that  thistles  flourish  best  the  farther  South  they  roam. 

Of  a  Scotch  family  also  was  Archbishop  Thomson  of  York. 
So  is  Archbishop  Mackray  of  Rupertstown.  Of  bishops,  besides 
the  archbishops,  there  are  now  six  in  England,  and  as  many  in 
the  Colonies.  Taking  up  a  recent  clerical  directory,  I  find  in 
the  Church  of  England  ministry  471  Macs.  Of  these,  two 
are  bishops,  8  are  archdeacons,  2  are  deans,  30  are  canons  and 
prebendaries.  Of  Andersons  there  are  260,  with  2  bishops 
and  2  canons.  Of  Camerons  and  Campbells  there  are  33,  of 
Cunninghams  15,  3  with  canonries  and  1  with  an  archdeaconry. 
Of  Douglases  there  are  40,  of  Grahams  44,  of  Hamiltons  47, 
of  Kennedys  33,  of  Murrays  34,  of  Duncans  and  Dunbars  25,  and 
so  on.  Some  of  these  minister  in  their  own  land  and  some  in 
the  colonies,  but  the  majority  of  them  are  in  England,  ousting 
our  modest  English  curates  from  livings  and  benefices.  Some 


THE  SWAMPING  OF  THE  CHURCH  49 


are  sons  of  Episcopalian  Scots,  more  are  sons  of  Scottish  Presby- 
terian ministers,  or  else  of  Presbyterian  farmers,  who  have 
crossed  the  Tweed  with  a  bawbee  in  their  pockets  to  see  what 
pickings  were  to  be  had  either  in  the  merchants'  offices  or  in  the 
Church.  Some  doubtless  are  sons  of  Scots  who  have  been  settled 
in  England  and  have  conformed.  At  an  earlier  period  it  was 
the  needy  and  hungry  Presbyterians  and  sons  of  Presbyterians 
who  came  over  to  England,  tired  of  oatmeal  porridge  and  whey, 
and  desirous  of  eating  roast  beef  in  English  parsonages,  and 
drinking  generous  port. 

Nor  is  this  all.  In  Ireland,  in  the  north,  were  colonists  from 
Scotland,  Presbyterians  j  and  these  took  boat  across  S.  George's 
Channel  to  lay  hold  of  anything  they  could  get  in  England  which 
Ireland  did  not  furnish  in  sufficient  profusion. 

The  migration  had  begun  before  the  disestablishment  of  the 
Irish  Church ;  it  has  swelled  in  volume  since  the  curates  "  com- 
pounded and  cut."  These  men  are  voluble,  insinuating,  for  the 
most  part  ultra-Evangelical,  and  have  been  accordingly  wel- 
comed by  Erastian  statesmen  and  Broad  Churchmen  ;  have 
been  hugged  to  the  heart  by  Evangelical  prelates  and  thrust 
into  livings,  deaneries  and  bishoprics. 

Looking  into  a  recent  Clergy  List,  I  find  seventy-four  O's,  and 
of  these  only  thirty  are  in  Ireland.  McNeile,  a  blustering 
Irishman  ,  was  given  the  deanery  of  Ripon.  This  is  the  man  who 
had  the  effrontery  to  send  about  an  advertisement  of  a  book 
of  his  as  by  "  that  great  and  good  man  Dr.  McNeile." 

Magee  was  made  Bishop  of  Peterborough  and  then  advanced 
to  York — a  witty  Evangelical.  The  Simeonite  and  other  Evan- 
gelical Trustees  who  have  acquired  the  patronage  of  so  many 
important  parishes  in  England  are  fain  to  import  Irishmen  to 
occupy  them,  because  the  English  supply  is  running  short. 

The  consequence  of  all  this  overwash  of  seas  is  that  the  vessel 
of  Christ's  Church  in  England  had  not  only  her  hold  full  of  the 
bilge-water  of  Conformists  of  1661-2,  but  also  that  she  had 
shipped  seas  fore  and  aft,  port  and  starboard,  from  France,  from 
Switzerland,  Germany,  Holland,  Scotland,  Ireland,  till  she  had 
settled  so  low  that  it  seemed  probable  she  would  founder,  with 
only  a  few  Churchmen  clinging  to  the  rigging. 


4 


CHAPTER  III 


A  REMNANT 

MATTERS  were  not,  however,  quite  so  bad  as  they 
appeared.  Out  of  the  livings  throughout  England 
and  Wales,  six  thousand,  or  about  half,  were  in  the 
gift  of  private  families,  those  of  the  nobility  and 
squirearchy  of  land. 

In  certain  cases  we  know  that  livings  were  put  in  the  market 
and  sold  to  the  highest  bidder,  and  were  bought  by  unscrupulous 
persons  who  perjured  themselves  before  the  bishop  when  they 
took  the  required  oath  against  simony.  Nevertheless,  the 
vast  majority  of  livings  to  which  the  country  gentry  presented 
were  given  honestly,  conscientiously,  to  men  whom  the  patrons 
respected. 

Throughout  the  eighteenth  century  the  Orthodox  clergy  were 
regarded  by  the  Court  and  by  the  Ministry  with  undisguised 
suspicion,  as  Jacobites.  It  was  quite  true  that  the  landed 
gentry  and  the  country  parsons  alike  had  no  love  for  the  House 
of  Hanover,  but  their  Jacobitism  was  sentimental  only,  and  went 
no  further  than  the  planting  of  Scotch  firs  and  drinking  the 
King's  health  over  the  water  in  their  finger-bowls. 

The  Whig  ministries,  however,  mistrusted  them,  and  eccle- 
siastical preferments  went  to  clergymen  who  were  either  Lati- 
tudinarian  in  their  opinions,  or  were  inoffensive  nobodies. 

In  Convocation,  the  Upper  House  had  been  composed  of 
Whig  Bishops  appointed  by  William  III  and  the  Whig  admini- 
stration during  the  first  half  of  Anne's  reign  ;  and  when  in  1717 
the  two  Houses  came  into  collision,  the  Lower  House  being  mainly 
composed  of  High  Churchmen,  the  Government  prorogued  Con- 
vocation with  intent  not  to  summon  it  again,  and  in  accordance 
with  this  resolution,  for  upwards  of  a  century  it  was  merely 
convened  as  a  matter  of  form  and  not  allowed  to  debate.  Thus 
the  English  Church  was  effectually  muzzled,  she  could  not  utter 
her  voice  on  any  point. 

50 


A  REMNANT 


51 


The  country  squires,  nearly  all  Tories,  when  they  presented 
to  the  livings  in  their  gift,  appointed  very  generally  relatives 
brought  up  in  their  own  political  opinions,  and  in  High-Church 
traditions.  If  they  had  not  relatives  to  promote,  they  nominated 
men  of  their  own  political  views,  which  at  that  time  went  hand 
in  hand  with  Orthodoxy,  more  or  less  theoretical,  always  inert. 
The  consequence  was  that  although  the  bishoprics,  deaneries, 
canonries,  Crown  and  Chancellor's  livings,  those  to  which  the 
Bishops  presented,  and  most  town  livings,  were  filled  with  colour- 
less men  without  definite  convictions,  throughout  the  country 
in  quiet  parsonages,  before  whose  windows  hollyhocks  bloomed, 
and  whose  porches  were  wreathed  with  woodbine,  were  living 
Churchmen,  well  read  in  the  old  English  divines,  Hooker, 
Andrewes,  Cosin,  Bull — if  not  also  in  the  Ancient  Fathers.  I 
happen  to  have  examined  the  library  of  one  of  these  parsons  who 
lived  in  the  reigns  of  George  III  and  IV  and  William  IV,  and  it 
consisted  of  the  works  of  these  divines  in  ponderous  tomes. 

Sir  Roger  de  Coverley  is  represented  as  taking  'great  pains 
to  secure  a  worthy  incumbent  for  his  Worcestershire  parish. 
I  do  not  for  a  moment  suppose  that  he  was  unique  in  this 
respect. 

Looking  at  the  Church  from  without,  she  seemed  to  be  water- 
logged and  motionless.  But  such  as  looked  deeper  saw  that 
there  was  still  life  in  her,  though  feeble.  Writing  of  the  Hano- 
verian times,  Mr.  Molesworth  says1:  "  Here  we  reach  a  period 
which  is  a  blank  in  our  narrative,  and  which  we  must  be  content 
to  leave  blank,  for  the  simple  reason  that  history  traces  the 
evolution  of  events,  and  that  when  there  is  no  evolution,  and 
consequently  no  progress,  there  can  be  no  history.  Even  at 
the  dead  period  we  have  now  reached,  there  was  probably  some 
movement,  but  it  was  so  sluggish  as  to  be  altogether  inappreci- 
able. It  is  true  that  there  were  archbishops  succeeding  one 
another  in  the  chair  of  Lanfranc,  Anselm,  Becket,  Laud  and 
Sancroft.  Carlyle  asks,  'Who  was  the  primate  of  England  at 
this  time  ?  '  and  he  answers  with  bitter  irony, '  No  man  knoweth.' 
Nor  was  this  far  from  the  truth.  There  were  contented  Eras- 
tians  like  Wake  and  Potter  carrying  on  controversies  now 
entirely  forgotten,  as  they  well  deserve  to  be.  There  were  men 
full  of  decencies  and  proprieties  like  Seeker,  but  who  cares  now 
to  know  what  Archbishops  Herring,  Hutton  and  Moore  thought, 
said  or  did  ?  I  have  searched  carefully  the  seven  volumes  of 

1  Molesworth  (W.  M.),  History  of  the  Church  of  England  (1882),  p.  297. 


52 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Lord  Mahon's  history  for  the  names  of  these  prelates,  but  have 
not  succeeded  in  meeting  with  any  of  them.  If  their  works  ever 
possessed  any  living  interest  or  any  particular  value,  they  have 
long  since  lost  it.  They  never  attempted  to  guide  or  elevate 
the  religious  destinies  of  the  nation  over  whose  Church  they 
uselessly  presided." 

The  same  characteristics  marked  almost  all  the  rest  of  the 
bishops.  If  we  wander  back  in  search  through  the  desolate 
wilderness  in  quest  of  some  men  upholding  the  prophetic  office, 
we  shall  find  none  save  in  lowly  nooks  and  far  from  towns.  Those 
clothed  in  purple  and  fine  linen  uselessly  occupied  episcopal 
palaces  ;  reeds  shaken  with  the  wind  were  in  decanal  and  pre- 
bendal  stalls.  The  debased  and  torpid  condition  of  the  Church 
was  due  entirely  to  the  Whigs.  The  Church  was  gagged,  and 
the  lower  clergy  depressed  ;  there  was  nothing  for  them  but  to 
wear  out  their  lives  in  country  parsonages,  far  from  the  current 
of  life  and  thought,  elbowed  into  corners,  trodden  underfoot  by 
the  plethoric,  well-fed  favourites  of  the  Ministry. 

From  what  has  been  said,  it  appears  certain  that  in  the  English 
Church  there  existed  elements  of  different  kinds  ready  to  start 
into  activity  when  the  opportunity  came — the  Evangelical,  out 
of  the  foreign  Calvinistic  material  forced  into  the  Church,  and 
the  Catholic  revival,  springing  out  of  her  inherent  nature.  The 
Church  for  three  centuries  was  subjected  to  Taliacotian  treat- 
ment. The  surgeon  Taliacotius  invented  and  practised  a  process 
of  cutting  a  hunk  of  flesh  out  of  the  person  of  one  man,  where 
it  could  best  be  spared,  and  engrafting  it  on  the  body  of  another. 
Thus  was  the  Church  of  England  dealt  with.  She  possessed  her 
own  organic,  apostolic,  Catholic  self,  patched  with  grafts  from 
various  foreign  bodies.  According  to  Hudibras  (Pt.  I.  cant,  i) 
so  soon  as  the  individual  died  from  whom  the  flesh  had  been 
taken,  the  grafts  fell  off  ;  and  now  that  Continental  Protestant- 
ism is  expiring  and  in  process  of  decomposition,  we  may  trust 
that  all  the  foreign  matter  which  has  been  patched  into  the  body 
of  the  Anglican  Church  will  likewise  drop  away.1 

The  time  at  last  came  when  the  Dead  Sea  of  the  Georgian 

1  Here  is  M.  Edouard  Rod's  description  of  French  and  Swiss  Evan- 
gelicalism— and  he  is  himself  a  Protestant.  It  is  a  "  rationalizing  religion, 
a  compromise  between  dogma  and  common  sense,  of  which  the  dialectic 
and  exegesis  are  lamentably  poor,  of  which  the  icy  worship  is  only  one 
endless  discourse — a  string  of  halting  metaphors — of  a  structure  so  feeble 
that  a  child  could  break  it,  recited  in  a  melancholy  voice  with  false  action 
and  whining  intonation — the  religion  which  cavils  instead  of  loving,  and 
parcels  itself  out  into  rancorous  sects." — Le  Sens  de  la  Vie  (1889),  p.  273. 


A  REMNANT 


53 


Church  was  to  be  ruffled  and  lashed  into  waves,  and  become  a 
sea  of  storms. 

The  old  Conformists  had  for  the  most  part  lost  their  zeal 
and  fanaticism  and  become  Latitudinarians,  but  some  few  still 
remained  with  the  old  venom  tingling  in  their  arteries.  But 
the  first  movement  sprang  more  immediately  out  of  the  descend- 
ants of  the  Huguenot  refugees,  the  Scottish  invaders,  and  the 
Germans  who  hung  on  to  the  skirts  of  the  Georges. 

We  may  liken  the  English  Church  to  the  goodly  heritage  of 
Christ  in  our  land,  held  by  indisputable  title-deeds.  To  this 
domain  came  troops  of  needy  squatters  from  various  lands,  who 
boiled  their  kettles  on  land  that  was  not  their  own,  tolerated 
in  kindly  pity.  They  trampled  down  every  green  blade  and 
broke  every  flower  ;  they  denied  it  with  their  refuse.  But  they 
were  aliens,  they  had  no  legitimate  position  where  they  lodged. 
Their  descendants,  waxing  wanton  and  insolent,  laid  claim  to 
the  whole  estate.  They  committed  the  strategical  error  of 
striking  for  monopoly,  and  for  ejecting  the  legitimate  tenants. 
This  necessitated  a  demand  for  their  leases.  They  had  none  to 
show.  All  their  claim  rested  on  the  indulgence  accorded  to  their 
forbears  to  be  allowed  to  squat. 

Meanwhile  they  had  wrought  incalculable  mischief.  They 
had  introduced  foreign  contagious  diseases,  had  robbed  hen- 
roosts, had  broken  down  hedges,  and  had  contaminated  the 
wells.  "  Sow'd  cockle  reap'd  no  corn,"  said  Biron  in  Love's 
Labour's  Lost. 

It  was  not  an  infiltration  but  an  inundation,  transforming 
the  aspect  and  quality  of  the  Anglican  Communion.  The  fine 
wine  of  Catholic  Orthodoxy  was  diluted  till  hardly  retaining 
any  of  its  colour,  glow  and  vinous  force. 

Take  a  clerical  directory  of  the  present  day  and  reckon  how 
many  names  of  the  clergy  are  German,  French,  Swiss,  Dutch, 
Jewish,  or  even  Swedish.  As  to  such  as  are  Scottish,  I  have 
already  dealt  with  them.  Under  the  letters  B  and  C  alone  a 
recent  directory  gives  us  123  names  of  clergy  unmistakably  of 
foreign  extraction.  John  Henry  Newman,  drawing  his  life  from 
a  mother  pertaining  to  a  Huguenot  family,  sucked  in  Calvinistic 
prejudices.  "  I  became  most  firmly  convinced  that  the  Pope  was 
the  x\ntichrist  predicted  by  Daniel,  S.  Paul  and  S.  John.  My 
imagination  was  stained  by  the  effects  of  this  doctrine  up  to  the 
year  1843."    He  once  preached  a  sermon  to  that  effect. 

Those  descended  from  Huguenots  felt  an  hereditary  pride 


54 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


in  the  fact,  and  hugged  their  Calvinism  as  a  precious  heirloom, 
not  to  be  surrendered  though  they  attended  Church  ministra- 
tions, not  even  if  they  themselves  ministered  in  the  pulpits  and  at 
the  altars  of  the  Church. 

But,  along  with  all  this  impregnation  of  the  pure  river  of  the 
Anglican  Church  with  foreign  matter,  it  was  not  wholly  and 
radically  contaminated.  It  was  like  a  mountain  stream  that 
receives  mud,  and  dye  from  cloth  mills,  till  it  becomes  thick, 
malodorous  and  sluggish.  The  vulgar  looking  on  and  sniffing  at 
it  come  to  regard  the  pace,  the  colour,  the  smell,  as  its  essential 
qualities,  and  even  get  to  relish  them.  These,  however,  are 
importations — they  were  not  in  it  at  first.  We  can  point  to 
where  and  when  they  flowed  in  and  befouled  the  stream. 

But  against  all  this  contamination  with  foreign  heresy  there 
is  something  to  be  said. 

In  the  Pyrenees,  in  the  Middle  Ages,  certain  valleys  were 
given  over  to  the  lepers.  To  them  they  were  confined.  They 
might  not  associate  with  the  healthy,  even  in  Divine  worship. 
They  were  called  the  Cagots.  But  the  pure  air  of  the  mountains, 
the  balsamic  breath  of  the  pines,  the  sweet  milk  of  their  kine, 
have  resulted  in  the  total  ehmination  of  leprosy,  and  the  des- 
cendants of  the  Cagots  are  as  healthy  and  vigorous  as  any  other 
mountaineers  ;  they  can  be  known  only  by  their  surnames.  It 
has  been  the  same  in  the  English  Church.  Some  of  our  ablest, 
most  devoted  and  most  Catholic  priests  are  descendants  of  the 
Cagots  from  Scotland,  France,  Switzerland,  Ireland,  and  Germany 
— nay,  even  from  our  recently  acquired  Transvaal.  The  Spirit 
of  God  breathing  in  the  Catholic  Church,  the  religious  atmosphere, 
the  fragrance  of  the  sanctuary,  the  pure  milk  of  the  Gospel,  have 
had  a  marvellous  effect  in  the  expulsion  of  the  germs  of  heresy, 
and  the  building  up  of  vigorous  Church  life.  And  yet  the  in- 
vading Cagots  were  not  confined  to  sequestrated  nooks,  but 
advanced  to  high  places. 

I  have  been  told  that  in  banknotes  a  fine  red  fibre  was  formerly 
introduced  into  the  texture,  and  that  unless  this  were  seen  and 
acknowledged,  the  note  was  worthless.  But  I  do  know,  that 
unless,  through  the  centuries,  there  had  existed  Catholic  faith  and 
tradition  from  the  period  before  the  Reformation,  sometimes  so 
finely  attenuated  as  to  be  scarcely  discernible,  at  other  times 
broadening  to  a  ribbon,  at  another  dyeing  the  whole  tissue,  the 
Church  of  England  would  have  been  as  utterly  worthless  as  a 
forged  banknote.    The  red  thread  has  ever  been  there ;  we  can 


A  REMNANT 


55 


see  it  at  every  period.  It  was  never  broken  :  in  the  Elizabethan 
period  it  was  tangled  up  with  some  coarse  hempen  threads,  in 
the  Puritan  time  it  was  overlaid,  in  the  Hanoverian  it  was  again 
overlaid,  but  it  was  there. 

The  conforming  Marian  clergy  had  hardly  died  out  before 
there  appeared  such  men  as  the  saintly  Lancelot  Andrewes,  the 
profoundly  learned  Richard  Hooker,  author  of  the  Ecclesiastical 
Polity,  of  which  Pope  Clement  VIII  declared  that  "  it  had  in 
it  such  seeds  of  eternity  that  it  would  abide  till  the  last  fire 
shall  consume  all  learning"  ;  Bancroft,  Overall,1  Young,  George 
Herbert  the  poet,  Moreton,  Laud  the  martyr,  Wren  also,  who 
was  specially  obnoxious  to  the  Puritans,  and  was  confined  as  a 
prisoner  in  the  Tower  from  1641  to  1660.  He  was  the  butt  of 
Puritan  satire  : 

A  little  Wren  came  flying  through  the  air, 
And  on  his  back  betwixt  his  wings  he  bore 
A  minster  stuffed  with  crosses,  altars'  store, 
With  sacred  Fonts  and  rare  gilt  cherubims, 
And  bellowing  organs,  chanting  curious  hymns. 

"  Buy  my  high  altars,5'  he  lifts  up  his  voice, 

"All  sorts  of  Mass-books  here  you  may  have  choice." 

Lambeth  Fair. 

There  were  others:  Felton,  Bishop  of  Ely,  the  friend  of 
Andrewes,  and  his  successor;  John  Buckeridge,  Laud's  tutor; 
Peter  Heylin,  who  stoutly  defended  the  position  of  the  English 
Church,  as  inherited  from  the  earliest  days,  Bilson,  Sutton,  Mon- 
tague, Cosin,  and  many  others.  The  red  thread  had  never  been 
broken,  or  such  a  manifestation  of  Church  feeling  could  not  have 
appeared.  Whence  did  these  men  derive  their  definite  ortho- 
doxy ?  The  Elizabethan  immigrants  had  not  a  grain  of  it  in  their 
whole  composition.  They  drew  it  from  Catholic  tradition  and 
the  study  of  the  Fathers.  They  were  so  learned  that  it  was 
said  of  them  on  the  Continent,  "  Clerus  Anglice  stupor  mundi." 

The  uprise  of  a  strong  definite  Church  feeling  towards  the 
close  of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  and  in  that  of  James  I,  is  a 
remarkable  phenomenon. 

For  a  little  while  the  Church  had  been  like  a  vessel  at  sea  in  a 
storm,  with  the  sailors  drunk  and  mutinous,  with  no  man  at  the 

1  Overall  said  :  "It  were  better  to  endure  the  absence  of  the  people 
than  for  the  minister  to  neglect  the  usual  and  daily  "  (Eucharistic)  "  sacri- 
fice of  the  Church."    So  Cosin,  his  secretary,  informs  us. 


56 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


wheel  and  no  captain  on  the  bridge.  But  now,  at  once,  the  officers 
started  up  and  insisted  on  order,  sent  the  mate  and  the  steers- 
man and  each  several  and  sulky  mariner  to  his  proper  place, 
to  do  his  proper  work.  Great  indeed  was  the  change.  Isaac 
Casaubon,  who  had  been  reared  in  Geneva  for  the  pastorate, 
revolted  against  the  narrowness,  the  inhumanity  of  Calvinism, 
and  its  absolute  severance  from  the  Christian  past.  He  came  to 
England  in  the  reign  of  J  ames  I ,  and  thence  wrote  to  his  old 
antagonist  in  controversy,  yet  friend,  Cardinal  Peron  :  "  The 
Anglican  Church  is  prepared  to  give  an  account  of  her  faith, 
and  to  prove  by  facts  themselves,  that  the  authors  of  the 
Reformation  established  here  did  not  propose  to  erect  any  new 
Church  (as  the  ignorant  and  malevolent  assert) ,  but  to  restore 
one  which  had  fallen  to  the  best  possible  form  ;  and  they  judged 
that  form  to  be  the  best  which  was  handed  down  to  the  rising 
Church  by  the  A~~>stles,  and  adopted  in  the  ages  nearest  to  them." 
During  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  it  was  not  possible  for  any  one  to 
feel  any  regard  for  the  Church.  It  was  like  a  family  in  which 
every  member  was  wrangling  with  every  other,  the  father  storm- 
ing, the  mother  scolding,  the  children  defiant  and  disobedient. 
But  the  impress  made  by  the  body  of  Catholic  feeling  among  the 
people  generally  produced  a  change  in  the  situation.  Rapidly 
men  realized  what  the  Church  really  was,  how  beautiful  and 
precious  was  the  Prayer  Book.  The  Church,  instead  of  being 
regarded  with  contempt,  was  looked  upon  with  hatred  on  one 
side  1  and  with  love  on  the  other  ;  so  much  so,  that  there  were 
men  during  the  Rebellion  and  Commonwealth  who  were  willing 
to  suffer,  for  the  sake  of  the  Church,  the  spoiling  of  their  goods, 
even  death  itself. 

Permit  me  to  look  back  and  briefly  trace  the  crimson  thread. 
That  there  were  very  decided  Churchmen  in  Jacobean  days  in 
some  of  the  parishes,  we  can  judge,  as  we  can  also  their  con- 
fidence of  gaining  the  upper  hand  over  the  Protestants  of  the 
Calvinistic  type,  by  the  great  cost  and  labour  displayed  in  the 
setting  up  of  chancel  screens  in  churches  that  were  without 
or  where  they  had  been  destroyed.  In  Devonshire  there  are  a 
limited  number  of  cases  only,  because  the  retention  of  the  older 
screens  had  been  general.    There  is  one  very  magnificent,  rich 

1  Robert  Parsons  wrote  in  1580  :  "I  mighte  bringe  the  opinion  of  all 
the  hotter  sort  of  Protestantes,  called  Puritayns,  who  in  wryting,  sermons, 
and  private  speeches,  doe  utterly  condemne  the  service  which  nowe 
Protestantes  have,  and  thereupon  doe  refrayne  from  it,  as  much  as  Catho- 
licks." 


A  REMNANT 


57 


with  carving,  gold  and  colour,  at  Lustleigh,  that  is  of  post- 
Reformation  date,  probably  of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  as  the 
panels  do  not  contain  Saints  but  clerics  and  choristers.  One 
very  similar  is  at  Bridf ord — evidently  by  the  same  craftsmen — in 
this  also  there  are  no  saintly  figures.  At  Holbeton  there  is 
another  ;  one  of  very  fine  quality  of  the  reign  of  James  I  at 
Washneld,  dated  1624  ;   another  at  Ermington. 

In  Somersetshire  the  post-Reformation  screens  are  much 
more  numerous.  Mr.  F.  Bligh  Bond  has  kindly  furnished  me 
with  the  following  list  :  (1)  Croscombe  (J as.  I).  (2)  Rodney 
Stoke  with  loft,  1625.  (3)  Low  Ham,  about  1630.  (4)  Mark, 
ID34-  (5)  East  Brent  with  loft,  1635,  now  removed  to  west 
end.  (6)  North  Newton  (Chas.  I).  (7)  Thurloxton.  (8)  Keyn- 
sham,  now  removed  to  serve  as  a  parclose.  Others  remain 
imperfect,  mutilated,  of  Caroline  date.  (9)  Bruton.  (10)  Ditch- 
eat,  now  in  private  hands.  (11)  Berrow,  post  and  beams 
of  loft,  1637.  (I2)  Bridgewater,  Elizabethan.  (13)  Norton 
S.  Philip,  two  screens.  (15)  Isle  Abbot.  (16)  Crowcombe.  (17) 
Ilminster,  a  baluster  screen. 

Earlier  screens  that  had  been  injured  were  restored  in  Jacobean 
and  Caroline  times.  (18)  Elworthy.  (19)  Nunney.  (20)  Pilton, 
a  chantry  screen.  (21)  Kingsbury  Episcopi.  (22)  Raddington. 
(23)  Loxton,  debased  Gothic.  (24)  Marston  Magna,  of  same  late 
Gothic  type.  (25)  Old  tymphanum,  with  heraldry  and  black- 
letter  texts  on  it  at  Wyke  Champflower, under  which  a  Jacobean 
screen  stood  until  recent  years.  (26)  Another  old  tymphanum 
with  Royal  arms  at  Stockleigh  English. 

It  is,  moreover,  exceptional  to  find  the  paintings  of  saints  on 
the  earlier  screens  wantonly  defaced.  The  number  of  very  richly 
carved  Altar  tables  that  pertain  to  the  J  acobean  period  certainly 
point  to  reverence  for  the  Lord's  Board.  The  Puritans  con- 
tented themselves  with  a  shabby  table,  moved  into  the  nave. 

The  Communion  Service  continued  to  be  the  principal  service 
for  the  Sunday,  and  was  choral.  The  earliest  setting  of  the 
English  office  is  that  called  the  Missa  Simplex,  an  adaptation 
of  the  old  Plain  Song  to  English  words.  It  was  performed  at 
the  opening  of  the  first  Parliament  of  King  Edward  VI  in  1547. 
The  next  was  that  by  Merbecke  published  in  1550,  conforming 
to  Archbishop  Cranmer's  rule  that  one  note  should  be  given  to 
each  syllable.1   This  was  re-issued  with  harmonies  so  as  to  be 

1  The  First  Prayer  Book  of  Edward  VI  assumed  that  the  Holy  Com- 
munion should  be  celebrated  daily  in  cathedrals  and  collegiate  churches, 


58 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


sung  by  four  voices  in  1560,  and  again  in  1565.    Next  came  that 
by  Tallis,  the  date,  according  to  Dr.  Rimbault ,  being  1570.  Un- 
happily only  the  bass  has  been  preserved.    The  Rev.  William 
Harrison,  who  became  Canon  of  S.  George's,  Windsor,  published 
a  Description  of  England  in  1577.    In  the  course  of  an  account 
of  the  Church  of  England  and  her  services,  he  says :   "  After 
morning  prayer  we  have  the  litanie  and  suffrages.  .  .  .  This 
being  done,  we  proceed  unto  the  Communion,  if  anie  communi- 
cants be  to  receive  the  Eucharist ;  if  not  we  read  the  decalog, 
epistle  and  gospell  with  the  Nicene  creed  (of  some  in  derision 
called  the  Drie  Communion) ,  and  then  proceed  unto  a  homilie  or 
sermon,  which  hath  a  (metrical)  psalm  before  and  after  it,  and 
finallie  unto  the  baptism  of  such  infants,  etc.  .  .  .  And  thus  doo 
we  spend  the  sabath  daie  in  good  and  godlie  exercises,  all  doone 
in  our  vulgar  toong,  that  each  one  present  may  heare  and  under- 
stand the  same,  which  also  in  cathedral  and  collegiat  churches 
is  so  ordered,  that  the  psalms  onlie  are  soong  by  note,  the  rest 
being  read  (as  in  common  parish  churches)  by  the  minister  with 
a  lowe  voice,  saving  that  in  the  administration  of  the  Communion 
the  quier  singeth  the  answers,  the  Creed  and  sundrie  other  things 
appointed,  but  in  so  plaine  and  distinct  manner,  that  each  one 
present  may  understand  what  they  sing,  every  word  having  but 
one  note,  though  the  whole  harmonie  consist  of  manie  parts, 
and  those  very  cunninglie  set  by  the  skillfull  in  that  science." 

As  Mr.  Royle  Shore  says  :  "It  was  not  until  some  seven  months 
after  the  accession  of  Elizabeth  that  the  English  rites  were 
resumed.  It  is  becoming  increasingly  admitted  that,  whatever 
may  have  happened  later,  on  the  restoration  of  the  Book  of 
Common  Prayer,  the  setting  and  accessories  of  the  services  did 
not  necessarily  differ  very  greatly  in  their  broad  features  from 
those  of  the  Latin  rites.  This  largely  helped  to  conciliate  those 
who  were  attached  to  the  former  state  of  things."  1 

I  am  indebted  to  Mr.  Royle  Shore's  paper  for  the  following 
list  of  composers  of  Communion  Services,  such  as  remain  in 
whole  or  in  part.  It  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  a  vast  amount 
of  our  old  Church  music  perished  in  1645,  at  the  dispersion  of 
the  choirs  and  the  destruction  of  organs.  It  is  probably  due  to 
this  that  none  has  been  recovered  of  the  period  of  James  I. 

and  more  frequently  than  on  Sundays  in  parish  churches,  for  it  directs 
the  omission  of  the  Exhortation  except  once  a  month. 

1  "The  Church  Eucharist  since  the  Reformation"  in  The  Cathedral 
Quarterly  (No.  2,  1913). 


A  REMNANT 


59 


Also,  in  some  cases  only  the  Kyrie  and  Creed  have  been  pre- 
served, probably  because  in  later  days  the  full  Communion 
Service  rendered  chorally  ceased  to  be  observed. 

First  Period  :  Edwardian  (1547-1558) 

(1)  Missa  Simplex  (plain  song) ,  1547. 

(2)  John  Merbecke,  organist  of  S.  George's,  Windsor  (plain 
song),  printed  in  1550. 

(3)  Thomas  Tallis  of  the  Chapel  Royal  (1575-1585) ,  Communion 
Service  in  five  parts ;  only  the  bass  remains. 

(4)  Thomas  Causton  (d.  1569) ,  of  the  Chapel  Royal,  for  men's 
voices,  printed  in  1560,  reprint  1913.  This  splendid  piece  of 
composition  has  been  neglected  till  the  present  date. 

Second  Period :  Elizabethan  (1558-1589) 

(5)  Robert  Whyte  (c.  1540-1575) ,  organist  of  Ely  and  West- 
minster, wrote  a  complete  Communion  Service  in  1560  that  is 
lost. 

(6)  Thomas  Causton  (as  above). 

(7)  Thomas  Heath,  a  Communion  Service  printed  in  1560. 

(8)  Thomas  Tallis  (as  above),  a  Communion  Service  in  the 
Dorian  mode  (about  1570),  printed  in  1641.1 

Third  Period  :  Caroline 

(9)  Adrian  Batten  (about  1590-1637),  organist  of  S.  Paul's, 
Communion  Service  in  the  Dorian  mode. 

(10)  John  Amner  (d.  1641),  organist  of  Ely.  Of  his  Com- 
munion Service  only  the  Gloria  in  Excelsis  remains. 

(11)  William  Child  (1606-1697),  organist  of  the  Chapel  Royal 
and  of  Windsor.  Communion  Service  in  the  Dorian  mode ; 
another  of  which  only  Kyrie  and  Credo  remain  for  four  voices  ; 
also  Sanctus  and  Gloria  in  Excelsis  for  eight  voices. 

Nor  did  the  composition  of  Choral  Communion  Services  end 
here,  but  continued  to  quite  a  late  period. 

George  Jeffries  (middle  of  the  seventeenth  century)  wrote  a 
complete  Communion  Service  some  time  after  1669.  Pelham 
Humphry  (1647-1674)  wrote  a  Communion  Service  in  E  minor. 
Loosemore  of  King's  and  Trinity  Colleges,  Cambridge  (1627- 

1  To  these  may  be  added  John  Brimley,  Master  of  the  Choristers  and 
organist  of  Durham,  1557-1576.  In  one  of  the  old  MS.  music  books  is 
"  Mr.  Brimly,  bis  Kerrie,"  followed  by  a  Credo. 


60 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


1670)  composed  a  Gloria  in  Excelsis  that  remains ;  John  Foster 
(d.  1677) ,  organist  of  Durham,  also  a  Gloria  ;  so  also  Michael  Wise 
(1638-168 3).  Jeremiah  Clark  (1670-1707),  Sanctus  and  Gloria 
in  A  minor.  John  Blow  (1648-1708),  organist  of  Westminster, 
Sursum  Cor  da,  Sanctus  and  Gloria  in  D,  also  Kyrie  and  Credo 
in  A,  also  a  complete  service  in  G,  another  in  six  parts  also  in  G. 
Henry  Aldrich  (1647-1710),  a  Communion  Service  in  G. 
Tobias  Langdon  (d.  1712),  succentor  of  Exeter  Cathedral,  a  Gloria 
in  Excelsis  in  B  minor. 

I  will  carry  the  list  no  further. 

It  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  rubrics  in  the  Communion 
Service  order  the  Creed  and  the  Sanctus  to  be  "  sung  or  said," 
whereas  in  Matins  and  Evensong  the  Psalms  are  to  be  "  said 
or  sung."  In  fact,  the  tradition  of  Choral  Eucharists  never  did 
die  out,  from  1548,  when,  as  we  read,  "  Powles'  Quire,  with 
divers  other  parishes  in  London,  sung  all  the  service  in  English 
to  the  Mettens,  Masse  and  Evensong ;  and  at  the  anniversary 
of  Henry  VII  kept  at  Westminster  on  May  12,  1548,  the  Mass 
was  sung  in  English  with  the  Consecration  of  the  Sacrament  also 
spoken  in  English."  In  fact,  the  rupture  in  the  tradition  of 
Choral  Eucharists  and  in  the  use  of  Plain  Song  was  due  to  the 
Rebellion.  At  the  Restoration  the  Choral  Communion  Services 
were  resumed  ;  but  as  the  tradition  of  Plain  Song  had  died 
during  the  period  of  the  triumph  of  Puritanism,  there  came  in, 
in  its  place,  Anglican  barred  Chants  making  chopped  nonsense 
of  the  words  ;  and  unecclesiastical  "  Services  "  for  the  canticles. 

In  Durham  the  Choral  Eucharists  continued  to  the  present 
day,  though  rendered  now  only  on  the  first  Sunday  in  the  month.1 
In  1696  Bishop  Compton  of  London  gave  directions  for  the 
singing  of  the  Sanctus  and  the  Gloria  in  Excelsis  in  his  cathedral. 
At  Exeter  "  in  connection  with  it  there  was  a  very  curious 

1  In  1685  Dr.  Granville  wrote  to  Sancroft :  "  Among  many  other 
excellent  things,  my  Lord  of  Durham  hath  strictly  enjoined  us  to  continue 
the  weekly  Communion  with  Jubilation"  (i.e.  choral). 

The  cantankerous  Smart  wrote  in  wrath  :  "A  strange  speech,  little 
better  than  blasphemy,  uttered  by  a  young  man  in  the  presence  of  his 
lord  and  many  learned  men  :  '  I  had  rather  go  forty  miles  to  a  good 
service  than  two  miles  to  a  sermon.'  And  what  meant  he  by  a  good 
service  ?  His  meaning  was  manifest  :  Where  goodly  Babylonish  gar- 
ments were  worn,  embroidered  with  images,  where  he  might  have  a 
delicate  noise  of  singers,  and  sackbuts  and  cornets  and  organs,  and,  if 
it  were  possible,  all  kinds  of  music,  used  at  the  dedication  of  Nabuchodo- 
nosor's  golden  Image."  There  can  exist  no  manner  of  doubt  that 
many  shared  the  opinion  of  this  young  man,  as  we  share  it  at  the  present 
day.  How  men  must  have  got  to  loathe  the  braying  of  the  preachers 
through  a  whole  hour  ! 


A  REMNANT 


61 


custom,  only  discontinued  within  comparatively  late  years.  As 
may  be  seen  by  reference  to  old  drawings  of  the  choir,  there 
were  two  altar  rails  at  Exeter — one  near  the  Holy  Table,  the 
other  at  some  distance.  Within  these  rails  the  communicants 
were  assembled,  and  the  sacred  Elements  administered  to  each 
by  the  officiating  priest  going  round  to  them.  At  the  Gloria  in 
Excelsis  the  ten  chorister  boys,  who  alone  appear  to  have  re- 
mained, were  ranged  outside  the  outermost  of  these  rails.  Two 
musical  settings  for  this  service  are  in  existence  ;  one  in  B 
minor  by  the  Rev.  Tobias  Langdon,  succentor  of  the  Cathedral 
(d.  1712),  the  other  by  William  Jackson  (d.  1803).  After  the 
service  the  boys  closed  the  procession  of  clergy,  each  party  filing 
off  to  its  respective  vestry.  But  when  the  Bishop  was  present, 
the  boys  preceded,  and  arranged  themselves  in  a  line,  on  their 
knees,  in  the  south  aisle,  to  receive  the  Bishop's  blessing  as  he 
passed  out  of  the  Cathedral  to  his  palace."  1 

Up  to  the  triumph  of  Puritanism  at  the  Rebellion,  it  would 
seem  that  the  Eucharist  had  been  the  principal  service  of  the 
Sundays  and  Feast  Days.  Matins  was  said  early,  at  6  or  7  a.m., 
the  Litany  later,  at  9  or  9.30  a.m.,  and  this  was  followed  by  a 
Choral  Communion.  John  Johnson,  writing  in  1709,  said  that 
it  was  an  innovation  to  run  the  three  services  together.  But 
even  in  the  reign  of  Charles  I  they  had  begun  to  be  joined,  as 
a  concession  to  the  later  hours  that  were  gradually  gaining 
ground,  and  as  Heylin  expresses  it,  "  because  of  the  sloth  of  the 
people."  But  long  after  the  Restoration  the  distinction  was 
maintained  in  some  places.2 

The  position  of  the  priest  at  the  Holy  Table  has  been  a  subject 
of  much  debate,  and  "  the  north  side "  has  been  variously 
interpreted.  The  north  side  is  not  the  north  end.  Actually  an 
altar  has  on  its  front  three  parts,  medium  and  two  cornua  or 
sides.  According  to  the  Sarum,  the  most  extensively  spread 
Use  in  England,  the  priest  at  High  Mass  ascended  to  the  Altar 
and  said  the  two  preparatory  prayers  at  the  south  horn  or  side  ; 
but  for  Low  Mass  he  said  them  at  the  north  hom  or  side.  Side 
or  horn  were  interchangeable  terms  :  thus,  in  the  Alphabetum 
Sacerdotum,  the  direction  as  to  the  Gospel  is  "  differat  missale 
ad  aliud  locus."  When  the  Prayer  Book  of  1552  was  being 
drawn  up,  Cranmer  was  unwilling  to  make  too  violent,  obvious 

1  Bumpus  (T.  F.),  The  Cathedrals  of  England  and  Wales  (London,  1905-6). 
*  Abbey  and  Overton,  The  English  Church  in  the  Eighteenth  Century 
(London,  1887),  p.  452. 


62 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


changes,  so  as  not  to  provoke  fresh  outbreaks  and  bloody 
reprisals.  He  introduced  the  rubric  as  to  the  position  of  the 
Holy  Table,  that  it  should  stand  either  in  the  body  of  the  Church 
or  in  the  chancel.  Now  in  pre-Reformation  times,  the  people 
in  a  large  cathedral  or  collegiate  church  communicated  not 
from  the  high  altar,  but  from  the  people's  altar  that  stood 
before  the  screen  at  the  chancel  steps.  The  high  altar  served 
for  the  Chapter  Mass.  This  may  be  seen  in  many  cathedrals 
and  large  churches  abroad  at  the  present  day.  For  instance, 
at  Cologne,  where  for  the  Chapter  High  Mass  the  priest  cele- 
brates at  the  high  altar,  but  for  the  Volksmesse  at  the  head 
of  the  steps  of  the  choir.  At  Genoa  the  high  altar  and  the 
people's  altar  are  back  to  back  ;  the  chapter  occupy  the  chancel, 
and  the  celebrant  stands  facing  west.  But  for  the  people's 
service  he  stands  facing  east,  and  the  two  altars  are  at  the 
choir  steps.  At  Chartres  Cathedral  a  wooden  altar  is  rolled  in 
early  on  Sunday  morning,  and  is  planted  below  the  steps  into 
the  choir  and  the  metal  screen.  About  it  are  set  up  temporary 
rails  hung  with  the  houseling  cloth.  Thence  the  people  are  com- 
municated, at  it  the  Children's  Mass  is  said,  after  which  it  is 
dismantled  and  rolled  out  of  sight.  Consequently  the  rubric 
directs  nothing  but  that  to  which  the  people  were  accustomed. 
So  also  that  requiring  the  priest  to  say  the  introductory  prayers 
standing  at  the  north  side  was  to  require  him  to  occupy  that 
position  which  the  congregation  was  accustomed  to  see  ;  as  they 
hardly  ever  saw  a  High  Mass,  save  in  cathedrals,  and  then  that 
was  not  their  mass. 

But,  during  the  outbreak  of  Puritanism  in  Elizabeth's  reign, 
the  fanatical  clergy,  compelled  to  conform  to  the  rubric,  did  so 
in  a  way  most  calculated  to  degrade  the  service,  by  turning 
the  Holy  Table  lengthwise,  "  oysterboard  fashion."  Laud  and 
the  bishops  in  the  reigns  of  James  I  and  Charles  I  insisted  on 
having  the  tables  replaced  altarwise  ;  but  with  the  Rebellion  and 
the  Commonwealth,  Presbyterians  and  Independents  resumed 
the  lengthwise  position  of  the  table.  At  the  Restoration,  and 
when  the  Church  came  to  her  own  again,  once  more  the  Holy 
Table  was  replaced  altarwise  ;  but  owing  to  the  hosts  of  Con- 
formists being  ordained,  it  was  not  possible  to  get  them  to  accept 
the  traditions  of  the  Church,  and  these  men  went  round  to  the  north 
end  looking  south  in  place  of  the  north  side  looking  east,  and 
this  had  to  be  borne  with  or  connived  at,  though  the  revisionists 
of  1661  surely  desired  a  return  to  the  proper  liturgical  position. 


A  REMNANT 


63 


No  sooner  did  Charles  II  regain  the  throne  than  staunch  up- 
holders of  Catholic  tradition  came  to  the  front.  Cosin  and  his 
son-in-law  Granville,  Peter  Gunning,  who  throughout  the  Puritan 
times  had  persisted,  at  the  risk  of  imprisonment,  in  reading 
the  Prayer  Book ;  Hackett  of  Lichfield,  who  at  once  set  to  work 
to  restore  his  beautiful  cathedral;  Wren,  who  came  forth  from 
his  prison  in  the  Tower  to  remount  his  throne  and  resume  the 
ceremonial  for  which  he  had  suffered  bonds  and  imprisonment ; 
Bramhall,  Thorndike,  a  liturgical  scholar,  Henry  Hammond,  a 
Laudian,  Anthony  Horneck,  Kettlewell,  and  many  more.  Next 
appeared  Ken,  Frampton,  Atterbury,  and  devout  laymen  such 
as  Robert  Nelson. 

Bad  as  were  the  appointments  to  sees  under  William  III, 
there  was  one  exception — John  Sharp,  who  was  made  Archbishop 
of  York,  in  this  case  probably  through  the  influence  of  Queen 
Mary.  He  was  a  model  bishop,  an  earnest  and  thorough  Church- 
man, greatly  preferring  the  first  Prayer  Book  of  Edward  VI  to 
that  of  1662. 

In  the  reign  of  Queen  Anne  the  Church  became  stronger, 
and  had  a  greater  hold  of  the  people  than  ever  before.  In  the 
Georgian  period  there  was  still  evidence  of  life.  We  see  it  in 
Bishops  Butler,  Wilson  and  Home.  Take,  for  instance,  the 
saintly  Bishop  Wilson  of  Sodor  and  Man.  The  Earl  of  Derby, 
who  was  "  King  of  Man,"  sent  a  governor  (Captain  Home),  and 
got  the  appointment  of  an  archdeacon,  Horobin,  with  the 
express  purpose  of  neutralizing  to  the  best  of  their  ability  the 
spiritual  work  of  the  Bishop.  In  1719  the  Governor's  wife  had 
grossly  slandered  a  woman  of  good  character  in  the  island,  and 
the  Bishop  refused  Communion  to  her  till  she  repented.  But 
the  Archdeacon,  to  oppose  the  Bishop,  communicated  her, 
whereupon  the  Bishop  suspended  him.  Thereupon  the  Governor 
threw  Bishop  Wilson  into  prison  on  S.  Peter's  Day,  1722,  and 
there  he  was  confined  for  nine  weeks  in  a  damp  cell,  in  which 
he  contracted  a  rheumatic  affection  that  disabled  him  ever  after 
from  the  free  use  of  his  right  hand.  But  "  the  concern  of  the 
people  was  so  great  that  they  assembled  in  crowds,  and  it  was 
with  difficulty  they  were  restrained  from  pulling  down  the 
Governor's  house,  by  the  mild  behaviour  and  persuasion  of  the 
Bishop,  who  was  permitted  to  speak  to  them  only  through  a 
grated  window,  or  address  them  from  the  walls  of  his  prison, 
whence  he  blessed  and  exhorted  hundreds  of  them  daily."  He 
was  wont  to  say  that  he  ruled  his  diocese  better  when  in  prison 


64 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


than  when  out  of  it.  The  love  borne  him  by  the  people  made 
them  more  amenable  to  his  discipline. 

The  Church  is  not  infrequently  blamed  for  the  low  condition 
to  which  she  sank  under  the  Hanoverian  rule  ;  but  unjustly. 
The  fact  was  that  she  was  so  paralysed  by  the  State  that  she 
could  do  nothing.  In  all  high  places  were  either  Latitudinarian 
Bishops  or  men  chosen  on  political,  not  on  religious  grounds. 
She  was  debarred  the  exercise  of  her  voice  in  Convocation  ;  she 
had  no  power  to  oppose  unsuitable  prelates  being  appointed 
to  rule  her. 

It  would  be  possible,  and  not  difficult,  to  form  a  full  catena 
of  faithful  men  holding  definite  Church  doctrine  from  the  time 
of  Henry  VIII  down  to  the  Victorian  period,  but  such  is  not 
my  object.  The  work  has  been  done,  for  the  tract  of  time 
between  1660  and  I7i4,by  Mr.  Overton.1  When  one  finds  gold 
grains  in  the  sand  at  one's  feet,  one  knows  that  a  gold  reef  is 
present. 

There  were  books  as  well  as  men  that  maintained  the  truth  ; 
books  read  in  quiet  parsonages,  in  manor-houses  and  in  citizen 
families,  sound  in  doctrine  and  inspired  with  true  devotion  ; 
moulding  the  opinions  and  shaping  the  spiritual  lives  of  tens  of 
thousands.  The  series  begins  even  during  the  Commonwealth 
with  The  Whole  Duty  of  Man  (1657),  *ne  authorship  of  which 
was  never  divulged.  It  sprang  almost  immediately  into  popu- 
larity. It  was  placed  with  the  Bible  and  Prayer  Book  as  the 
indispensable  requisites  of  the  Christian  life  ;  it  was  issued  in 
innumerable  editions.  From  first  to  last  it  is  a  plain,  sober,  ortho- 
dox statement  of  Church  doctrine  j  it  does  not  turn  to  right 
or  left,  to  Geneva  or  to  Rome.  There  can  be  no  better  proof 
of  the  deep-rooted  place  the  Church  had  taken  in  the  affections 
of  the  people  than  its  extraordinary  success.  Then  came  Jeremy 
Taylor's  Golden  Grove  and  Holy  Living  and  Dying  j  there  ap- 
peared notable  expositions  of  the  Church  Catechism  by  Hammond 
and  by  Ken  and  Beveridge.  Conspicuous  among  books  of 
devotion  for  the  Holy  Communion  was  that  issued  by  Arch- 
deacon Lake,  putting  forth  advanced  views  without  compromise 
or  disguise,  and  which  maintained  its  popularity  for  a  very  long 
time.  But  there  were  numerous  other  devotional  works  for  the 
Holy  Communion.  I  will  mention  but  two.  In  1738  appeared 
Samuel  Keble's  Week's  Preparation  for  a  worthy  reception  of 
the  Eucharist,  and  another  edition  appeared  in  1742.    But  it 

1  See  as  well  Dean  Stephen's  Life  of  Dean  Hook  (1879),  i.  chap.  iv. 


A  REMNANT 


65 


was  couched  too  much  on  the  lines  of  the  "  Song  of  Solomon," 
and  exception  was  taken  to  its  almost  sensuous  raptures.  Then 
appeared  The  New  Week's  Preparation,  which  went  rapidly 
through  edition  after  edition.  In  seven  years  it  passed  through 
thirty-four  editions.  The  book  consisted  of  two  parts  ;  the 
second  is  entitled  The  Companion  for  the  Altar,  and  this  continued 
to  be  reprinted  almost  year  by  year  down  to  1870.  There  are 
no  tokens  in  it  of  anything  but  strong  Catholic  doctrine  on  the 
Real  Presence.  Here  is  a  prayer  for  Monday  morning  :  "  Rise, 
my  soul,  and  take  thy  swiftest  wings  ;  fly  to  this  great  mystery. 
There  we  shall  see  the  Prince  of  Peace  sacrifice  Himself  to  re- 
concile us  with  the  Father ;  there  we  shall  see,  O  stupendous 
mercy  !  the  Son  of  God  with  heavenly  food  entertaining  the 
sons  of  men.  Can  we,  O  dear  Redeemer  !  believe  the  wonders 
of  this  mystery,  and  not  be  ravished  with  admiration  of  Thy 
great  goodness  ?  Can  we  acknowledge  Thy  perfect  veracity,  and 
not  believe  this  wonder  of  Thy  love  ?  Let  us  not  then  refuse  to 
believe  our  God,  because  His  mercies  transcend  our  capacities, 
etc."  After  the  Consecration  comes  this  prayer  :  "  Now,  O  my 
God,  prostrate  before  Thine  altar  I  dare  not  so  much  as  look 
upon  this  mystery  of  our  salvation,  if  Thou  hadst  not  invited 
me.  I  beseech  Thee,  therefore,  accept  of  this  representation 
we  make  before  Thee  of  that  all-sufficient  sacrifice,  which  Thy 
Son  our  Saviour  Jesus  Christ  made  upon  the  cross.  Let  the 
merit  of  it  plead  effectually  for  the  pardon  and  forgiveness  of 
all  my  sins,  etc."  Then  we  have  Bishop  Wilson's  Sacra  Privata 
and  Instructions  for  the  Lord's  Supper. 

Nelson's  Festivals  and  Fasts  had  a  wide  and  enduring  popu- 
larity. Sparrow,  Bishop  of  Exeter,  in  his  Rationale  of  the  Book 
of  Common  Prayer,  showed  how  that  it  was  drawn  from  Catholic 
sources. 

There  was  a  book  by  Jane  West,  Letters  to  a  Young  Lady,  that 
appeared  in  1806  and  ran  into  three  editions  in  the  same  year.  A 
fourth  came  out  in  1811.  Jane  West  devoted  two  long  chapters 
to  Calvinism,  and  insisted  on  the  poisonous  nature  of  its  doctrine. 
She  fairly  traced  its  introduction  into  England  from  abroad. 
When  she  comes  to  the  teachings  of  the  Church  of  England 
she  is  thoroughly  sound.  She  had  already  issued  Letters  to  a 
Young  Man  on  First  Entering  into  Life,  the  sixth  edition  of  which 
appeared  in  1818  couched  on  the  same  lines. 

This  is  but  a  slight  notice,  but  it  suffices  to  show  that  the  red 
line  was  never  broken. 
5 


66 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


In  the  Hanoverian  period  of  cloud  and  thick  darkness,  among 
the  clergy  who  still  held  the  faith,  their  orthodoxy  was  instinctive 
rather  than  due  to  well-grounded  conviction.  The  orthodox 
clergy  were  like  men  groping  in  the  dark,  asking  to  be  led — 
knowing  whither  they  desired  to  go,  but  unable  themselves  to 
find  the  way. 

The  one  tenet  they  clung  to  with  both  hands  was  the  Apostolic 
Succession,  and  the  divine  institution  of  the  Episcopal  order. 

"  My  reverend  brethren,"  said  Bishop  Horsley  in  his  charge 
of  1790,  "  we  must  be  content  to  be  High  Churchmen — or  we 
cannot  be  Churchmen  at  all,  for  he  who  thinks  of  God's  ministers 
as  mere  servants  of  the  State  is  out  of  the  Church,  severed  from 
it  by  a  kind  of  self -excommunicat ion." 

"  To  God,"  wrote  Archdeacon  Wrangham  in  1823,  "  and  not  to 
a  patronising  Crown  or  to  an  electing  people,  we  can  authorita- 
tively refer  our  origin  as  a  ministry.  For  Christ,  we  are  expressly 
told  in  Scripture,  sent  the  Apostles  with  a  power  to  send  others, 
thus  providing  an  unbroken  succession  for  all  coming  ages,  and 
promised  to  be  with  them  always,  even  to  the  end  of  the  world." 

Later,  Samuel  Wilberforce,  when  incumbent  of  Checkendon, 
let  it  be  plainly  seen  that  he  believed  in  Baptismal  Regenera- 
tion ;  and,  preaching  at  Bishop  Sumner's  Visitation  in  1833,  he 
boldly  called  on  the  clergy  to  "  prize  at  a  higher  rate  that  un- 
broken succession  whereby  those  who  ordained  us  are  joined 
unto  Christ's  own  Apostles,"  and  he  spoke  strongly  on  "  the 
danger  of  quitting  the  high  vantage  ground  of  Apostolical 
authority  to  fight  the  battle  out  upon  the  doubtful  level  of 
Erastian  principles." 

After  the  Reform  Bill,  and  the  suppression  of  some  of  the 
Irish  sees,  Churchmen  in  England  were  in  perpetual  alarm. 
"  We  felt  ourselves,"  wrote  Mr.  Palmer,  "  assailed  by  enemies 
from  without  and  from  within.  Our  prelates  insulted  and 
threatened  by  ministers  of  the  State  .  .  .  clamours  loud  and 
long  for  the  overthrow  of  the  Church  ;  Dissenters  and  Romanists 
triumphing  in  the  prospect  of  its  subversion,  and  assailing  it 
with  every  epithet  calculated  to  stimulate  popular  hatred."1 
Danger  menaced  from  the  timidity  of  the  Bishops  and  other 
dignitaries,  who  were  prepared  to  cast  out  the  lading  of  the 
ship,  her  doctrines  and  rites,  if  only  they  could  save  their  own 
position. 

Thus  menaced,  a  declaration  was  drawn  up  addressed  by 
1  Palmer  (Rev.  W.),  Narrative  of  Events  (1883),  p.  8. 


A  REMNANT 


67 


the  clergy  to  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury.  "  At  a  time  when 
events  are  daily  passing  before  us,  which  mark  the  growth  of 
Latitudinarian  sentiments  and  the  ignorance  that  prevails 
concerning  the  spiritual  claims  of  the  Church,  we  are  especially 
anxious  to  lay  before  your  Grace  the  assurance  of  our  devoted 
adherence  to  the  apostolical  doctrine  and  polity  of  the  Church 
over  which  you  preside,  and  of  which  we  are  ministers  ■  and  our 
deep-rooted  attachment  to  that  venerable  Liturgy,  in  which 
she  has  embodied  in  the  language  of  ancient  piety  the  orthodox 
and  primitive  faith."  This  was  signed  by  seven  thousand  clergy, 
against  the  expressed  opposition  of  the  dignitaries  and  the  aloof- 
ness of  the  Bishops.    The  Evangelical  clergy  did  not  sign. 

This  was  followed  by  a  declaration  to  much  the  same  effect 
by  230,000  heads  of  families  among  the  laity  ;  and  was  pre- 
sented to  the  King  on  May  27,  1833. 

Such  declarations  show  that  there  existed  still  a  strong  and 
faithful  remnant  in  the  Anglican  Church,  ready  to  make  itself 
heard,  and  to  act,  and  that  it  would  not  tolerate  any  watering 
down  of  her  formularies.  The  red  line  was  not  ruptured .  Church 
Unions  were  formed  in  London,  Bristol  and  elsewhere,  for 
general  Church  extension,  an  increase  of  the  Episcopate,  with 
some  valid  security  against  unfit  appointments,  the  revival  of 
Convocation,  and  the  restoration  of  Discipline. 

There  is  further  evidence  of  the  existence  of  distinct  orthodoxy 
among  the  clergy  of  the  Early  Victorian  age.  When  the  Gorham 
judgment  had  been  delivered,  and  Archbishop  Sumner  was 
prepared  to  institute  Mr.  Gorham  into  the  living  of  Bampford 
Speke  in  defiance  of  his  diocesan,  Henry,  Bishop  of  Exeter, 
summoned  a  synod  of  the  diocese  to  protest.  This  proceeding 
excited  the  liveliest  alarm  among  Whigs  and  Latitudinarians. 
Here  was  the  torpid  Church  showing  unwelcome  signs  of  vitality, 
and  resistance  to  the  judgment  of  the  Privy  Council,  ready  to 
declare  what  is  the  faith  of  the  Church  against  the  ruling  of 
the  judges.  On  May  2,  1851,  Mr.  Childers,  in  the  House  of 
Commons,  asked  the  Prime  Minister  what  the  Government  was 
prepared  to  do  in  the  case — whether  the  meeting  of  the  synod 
could  not  be  prohibited.  Lord  John  Russell  referred  the  matter 
to  the  law  officers  of  the  Crown,  and  was  surprised  and  discon- 
certed to  learn  that  there  existed  no  law  in  the  Statute-book 
prohibiting  the  holding  of  diocesan  synods. 

The  Bishop  had  desired  the  Archdeacons  to  inform  the  clergy 
that  he  would  hold  the  Synod  on  June  25  and  two  following 


68 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


days  ;  and  the  object  would  be  to  make  a  declaration  of  firm 
adherence  to  the  articles  in  the  Creed — "  I  acknowledge  one 
Baptism  for  the  remission  of  sins,"  and  the  doctrine  of  the 
Church  on  the  Grace  of  that  Sacrament,  as  set  forth  in  the 
Catechism. 

The  Synod  met,  and  was  attended  with  the  utmost  success. 
Of  thirty-two  rural  deaneries  in  the  diocese  only  two  failed  to 
send  representatives.  "  Considering,"  says  the  Report  of  the 
Metropolitan  Church  Union,  "  the  pains  taken  to  defeat  the 
Bishop's  intention  by  preventing  the  Clergy  from  assembling  in 
such  numbers  as  to  constitute  a  fair  representation  of  the  diocese, 
the  result  is  highly  encouraging.  No  less  gratifying  is  the  fact 
that,  in  spite  of  the  endeavours  made  to  excite  the  public  feeling 
in  opposition  to  the  Synod,  to  an  extent  which  seemed  at  one 
time  to  threaten  the  peace  of  the  Cathedral  city,  no  commotion 
or  demonstration  of  any  kind  took  place,  but  the  synod  was 
protected  in  the  discharge  of  its  functions  by  an  evident  feeling 
of  respect  on  the  part  of  a  populace,  certainly  not  prejudiced 
in  favour  of  its  proceedings." 

The  declaration  "  On  Baptism  "  agreed  on  by  the  Synod 
was  of  an  uncompromising  character,  definite  in  proclamation 
of  the  faith  of  the  Universal  Church  and  of  that  of  England  in 
particular.  It  was  a  declaration  that  the  Church  in  the  diocese 
of  Exeter  utterly  repudiated  the  decision  of  the  Privy  Council. 
The  clergy  had  loyally  rallied  about  their  Bishop,  and  had  upheld 
the  Catholic  Faith  as  maintained  by  the  formularies  of  the  Church 
in  the  matter  of  Baptismal  Regeneration. 

Mr.  Gladstone  and  the  Bishop  of  Oxford  were  of  opinion 
that  had  the  English  Bishops  met  and  issued  a  joint  proclamation 
affirming  the  doctrine  of  the  Church  in  this  matter,  there  would 
not  have  ensued  many  secessions.  But  the  prelates  were  too 
timorous,  too  much  afraid  of  offending  the  Liberal  Ministry  under 
Lord  John  Russell,  to  take  this  step. 

''Alas!"  wrote  Bishop  Wilberforce  at  the  time,  "all  is  very 
dark  around  us.  I  fear  we  shall  lose  some  of  our  very  best 
men,  and  my  heart  bleeds  at  every  pore  at  the  prospect.  But 
I  firmly  believe  in  the  vitality  of  the  Church  of  England,  that 
it  will  throw  off  the  evil  of  such  a  loss  of  best  blood  as  this." 
So  a  good  many  of  "  our  very  best  men  "  were  sacrificed  because 
the  Bishops  neglected  to  do  what  in  duty  they  were  bound 
to  do.  "  The  conies  are  but  a  feeble  folk,"  said  Solomon,  and 
alas !  at  this  period  the  conies  ruled  over  the  nobler  beasts. 


A  REMNANT 


69 


I  may  here  quote  Miss  Mitford  in  Beljord  Regis  (1835) ,  who,  after 
describing  the  revived  activity  in  the  Church,  gives  a  delightful 
sketch  of  the  orthodox  clergyman  :  "  I  cannot  help  entertain- 
ing relentings  in  favour  of  the  well-endowed  clergyman  of 
the  old  school,  round,  indolent,  and  rubicund,  at  peace  with 
himself  and  with  all  around  him,  who  lives  in  quiet  and  plenty 
in  his  ample  parsonage-house,  dispensing  with  a  liberal  hand  the 
superfluities  of  his  hospitable  table,  regular  and  exact  in  his 
conduct,  but  not  so  precise  as  to  refuse  a  Saturday  night's  rubber 
in  his  own  person,  or  to  condemn  his  parishioners  for  their  game 
of  cricket  on  Sunday  afternoons  ;  charitable  in  word  and  deed, 
tolerant,  indulgent,  kind  to  the  widest  extent  of  that  widest 
word.  .  .  .  There  he  goes,  rotund  and  rosy,  a  tun  of  a  man, 
filling  three  parts  of  his  roomy  equipage  ;  the  shovel  hat  with 
a  rose  in  it,  the  very  model  of  Orthodoxy  overshadowing  his 
white  hairs  and  placid  countenance.  There  he  goes  in  whose 
youth  Tract  societies  and  adult  schools  were  not,  but  who  yet 
has  done  as  much  good  and  as  little  harm  in  his  generation, 
has  formed  as  just  and  as  useful  a  link  between  the  rich  and 
the  poor,  the  landlord  and  the  peasant,  as  ever  did  honour  to 
religion  and  to  human  nature." 

Very  charming  is  Lord  Selborne's  account  of  his  own  father, 
the  Rev.  W.  Joscelyn  Palmer  (b.  1778,  d.  1833),  Rector  of  Mix- 
bury  and  Finmere,  holding  the  former  living  for  forty-seven 
years.  "  I  have  heard  some  people  speak  as  if  the  care  of  a  few 
hundred  souls  were  insufficient  employment  for  the  zeal  and 
energy  of  a  clergyman  of  mark.  What  God  had  charged  him 
with  was  the  care  of  those  five  or  six  hundred  people  at  Mixbury 
and  Finmere,  for  whom  there  was  no  one  else  to  care  ;  among 
whom  there  was  no  praise  to  be  won,  no  distinction  to  be 
attained,  no  ambition  to  be  gratified.  He  was  content  with  this, 
and  sought  nothing  more.  The  people  he  loved  and  willingly 
served,  wisely  also  and  discreetly,  as  a  spiritual  father  and 
friend,  who  understood  them,  and  was  able  to  speak  to  them  in 
a  way  which  they  could  understand.  There  was  not  one,  young 
or  old,  whom  he  did  not  observe  and  study.  His  interest  in 
individuals  was  not  capricious  or  transitory,  but  patient  and 
persevering.  It  was  long  before  he  despaired  (if  he  ever  did 
despair)  even  of  those  who  went  astray."1  We  are  further  told 
that  Mr.  Palmer  was  a  staunch  Anglo-catholic  priest  in  church, 
in  advance  of  his  time,  both  as  to  reverence  and  as  to  rubrical 

1  Memorials,  by  Roundell  Palmer,  Earl  of  Selborne  (1896),  i.  5-8. 


70 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


strictness.  Where  the  High  Church  clergy  failed  and  proved 
faulty  was  in  their  remaining  content  with  the  very  minimum 
of  worship.  The  Church  unquestionably  required  that  they 
should  observe  daily  prayer  twice  in  their  churches,  and  should 
celebrate  the  Eucharist  at  the  least  every  Lord's  Day  and  every 
Holy  Day.  They  contented  themselves  with  two  services  on 
the  Sunday  and  with  Communion  once  a  month  at  oftenest, 
and  made  no  attempt  to  improve  on  what  had  become  the  routine 
before  their  time. 

When  I  was  a  boy,  in  my  neighbourhood  all  the  clergy  with 
two  exceptions  were  in  theory  High  Churchmen.  One  of  the 
exceptions  was  a  very  worthy,  spiritually-minded  man  who 
served  two  churches,  and  was  mildly  Evangelical;  the  other 
was  the  Vicar  of  Tavistock.  The  vicars  there  were  appointed 
by  the  Whig  Dukes  of  Bedford,  who  always  nominated  men  of 
no  definite  Church  opinions. 

One  of  these  actually  proposed  to  banish  the  Church  Catechism 
from  the  National  School,  although  there  existed  in  the  town 
an  undenominational  British  School.  The  subscribers  to  the 
National  School  were  incensed,  and  pertinently  inquired  for  what 
their  subscriptions  were  solicited,  if  in  the  Church  school  Church 
doctrines  were  not  to  be  taught. 

But  in  Tavistock  of  recent  years,  the  tide  has  notably  risen, 
and  there  are  now  daily  prayers,  and  weekly  and  Saints' -day 
Communions. 

I  do  not  suppose  that  in  any  Christian  church  except  the 
Evangelical  and  Calvinistic  communities  in  Germany,  which 
do  not  pretend  to  be  a  part  of  Catholic  Christendom,  such  long- 
protracted  and  cogent  efforts  have  been  made  to  degrade  and 
dedoctrinize,  as  have  been  made  by  the  State  in  England,  which 
had  encroached  on  and  neutralized  the  liberties  of  the  Church, 
guaranteed  to  her  by  Magna  Charta. 

In  the  Turkish  Empire,  although  there  has  been  persecution 
of  the  Christians,  the  Sublime  Porte  has  never  interfered  with 
the  teaching  and  the  worship  of  the  Orthodox  Churches. 

The  nearest  approach  to  the  condition  of  affairs  we  have  gone 
through  was  under  Constantius,  when  he  forced  Arians  into  the 
bishoprics,  or  under  Anastasius  I  when  he  filled  the  sees  with 
Monophysites.  That  was  but  for  a  time.  But  in  England  the 
evil  began  with  Charles  II,  was  accentuated  under  William  III, 
and  was  carried  on  with  but  slight  intermission  till  the  middle 
of  the  reign  of  Queen  Victoria,  and  even  considerably  later. 


A  REMNANT 


71 


First  came  the  Conformists  bribed  with  mitres,  then  from  1689 
to  the  appointment  of  such  men  as  Thomson  and  Tait  to  our 
own  two  Archbishoprics,  for  something  like  a  hundred  and 
eighty  years,  did  this  continue. 

In  olden  times  there  existed  in  England  a  punishment  entitled 
Peine  forte  et  dure,  that  consisted  in  prostrating  the  victim  on 
the  floor,  and  putting  lumps  of  lead  in  slow  succession  on  his 
chest  till  the  life  was  squeezed  out  of  him.  And  it  was  in  this 
way  that  Statesmen  dealt  with  the  Church  of  England  for  two 
centuries — and  these  lumps  of  lead  were  all  stamped  with  mitres. 
Some  were  lighter,  others  were  oppressive,  but  together  they 
nearly  drove  the  breath  of  life  out  of  her.  Happily  the  vitality 
of  the  Church  was  sufficient  to  enable  her  to  swell  her  lungs 
and  endure  them  with  such  patience  as  she  could  muster,  till  a 
gracious  Providence  tumbled  them  off,  and  dropped  them  into 
Lethe. 

Here  and  there,  wide  dispersed,  were  men  who  looked  back 
with  sadness,  and  looked  forward  without  hope,  who  said  to 
themselves,  like  Elijah  in  the  reign  of  Ahab  :  "I,  even  I  alone 
am  left !  "  Yet  it  was  not  so — it  was  through  that  miserable 
time  as  when  Jezebel  threw  down  the  altars  and  persecuted  the 
prophets.  God  Almighty  knew  what  man  did  not — that  there 
were  left  to  Him  seven  thousand  in  Israel,  all  the  knees  that  had 
not  bowed  unto  Baal,  and  the  mouths  that  had  not  kissed  him. 

Owing  to  total  absence  of  salt  in  Central  Africa  the  cattle 
of  the  natives  suffer  from  a  polypuslike  parasitic  growth  in  the 
intestines  that  drains  away  the  vital  juices,  affects  the  tissues, 
and  reduces  the  yield  of  milk  to  meagreness  in  quantity  and 
quality.  On  the  other  hand,  in  the  Alps,  in  the  crisp  early  dawn, 
the  herdsman,  furnished  with  a  wallet  full  of  rock-salt,  stands 
at  the  door  of  his  hut  and  calls  in  patois  "Kith  seelef  Kuh 
seele  !  "  whereupon  from  all  the  pastures,  with  bells  tinkling,  come 
galloping  the  cattle  to  receive  from  his  hands  the  renovating 
and  health-giving  condiment,  that  ensures  their  vigour  and  the 
abundance  and  sweetness  of  their  milk. 

The  English  Church  was  full  of  abuses  and  corruption  that 
had  reduced  her  vitality.  Her  intestines  were  choked  with  the 
loathsome  growths  of  indifference,  Erastianism,  neglect  of  duties, 
pomposity,  secularity.  Then  came  the  Tract  writers  with  the 
salt  of  the  Catholic  Faith — and  since  then,  all  is  changed  ;  the 
Church  is  full  of  vigorous  life,  the  clergy  are  energetic,  and 
the  quality  of  their  teaching  is  improved.    The  churches  are 


72 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


transformed  ;  and  life,  beauty  and  joy  have  become  the  char- 
acteristics of  worship  in  them. 

And  now  to  give  some  of  my  personal  experiences.  My  uncle 
Charles  was  born  in  1807,  and  became  rector  of  Lew  Trenchard 
in  1832.  I  do  not  conceive  that  he  ever  read  the  Tracts  for  the 
Times  ;  at  all  events  they  were  not  comprised  in  his  library.  But 
he  preached  incessantly  on  Baptismal  Regeneration  and  the 
Real  Presence,  and  at  Ember-tide  on  the  Apostolic  Succession 
and  the  Constitution  of  the  Church.  There  was  nothing  ap- 
proaching to  Ritualism  in  the  services,  but  as  to  his  convictions, 
of  them  there  could  be  entertained  no  doubt.  To  him  I  owe 
a  great  debt  of  gratitude.  Indeed,  I  may  say  that,  to  a  large 
extent,  he  moulded  my  opinions.  He  was  wont  to  give  me 
Paget's  Village  Tales,  and  Neale's  Stories  from  Church  History, 
as  also  Monro's  Allegories.  My  mother  gave  me  Sparrow's 
Rationale.  Later  I  had  Wordsworth's  Theophilus  Anglicanus, 
which  absolutely  fixed  my  belief. 

Then,  again,  my  mother,  a  daughter  of  Admiral  Thomas 
Godolphin  Bond,  R.N.,  was  born  in  1808,  and  married  in  1832, 
after  which  we  lived  so  much  abroad  that  she  was  never  brought 
within  the  influence  of  the  Oxford  movement.  Nevertheless  she 
had  been  reared  in  definite  Church  doctrines  ;  she  used  daily 
Bishop  Cosin's  Book  of  the  Seven  Canonical  Hours,  and  would 
never  communicate  except  fasting,  although  the  celebrations 
were  always  late. 

My  very  old  friend,  Canon  Fowler  of  Durham,  tells  me  of  his 
grandfather,  William  Fowler  of  Winterton,  Lincolnshire  (1761- 
1832),  a  man  famous  for  his  engravings  of  Roman  pavements, 
stained  glass,  etc.,  that  he  was  a  thorough  Churchman  all  his 
life,  never  missing  Sunday  morning  or  afternoon  service,  or  Holy 
Communion.  He  was  much  stirred  by  the  piety  of  the  first 
Wesleyans,  and  became  a  Class-leader,  yet  without  breaking 
away  from  the  Church. 

When,  in  his  last  illness,  he  desired  private  Communion,  he 
requested  the  Vicar  to  wear  his  surplice  and  to  bring  the  parish 
clerk  with  him  to  make  the  responses,  "  that  it  might  be  more 
like  Church."  One  of  his  favourite  books  was  Jeremy  Taylor's 
Holy  Living ;  his  copy  bears  his  pencil- marks  of  approval  in 
many  places ;  and  in  the  margin  opposite  to  where  fasting  Com- 
munion is  recommended  "  unless  it  be  in  the  case  of  sickness,  or 
other  great  necessity,"  he  had  written,  "  This  puts  me  in  mind  of 


A  REMNANT 


73 


my  dear  grandmother.  May  I  follow  her  example  in  that  which 
is  good.  Amen."  Her  maiden  name  was  Mary  Taylor,  and 
it  is  recorded  of  her  that  "  she  never  neglected  the  Church  or 
Holy  Sacrament,  and  always  received  the  latter,  after  due  pre- 
paration, fasting." 

That  Holy  Communion  was  received  fasting  was  a  pretty 
general  usage  among  pious  people,  as  we  learn  from  Vaux's 
Church  Folk  Lore,  in  which  a  great  many  instances  are  given. 

At  Lumncott,  a  very  small  parish,  containing  sixty-two 
persons,  of  which  the  living  was  worth  as  many  pounds,  and  some 
glebe,  with  no  resident  gentry  and  but  one  large  farm,  in  1791 
the  parishioners  at  their  own  expense  rebuilt  the  church  tower. 
When  I  first  knew  it,  in  early  life,  the  incumbent  was  the  Rev. 
Frank  Parker,  a  scholar,  well  read  in  Patristic  theology.  He 
possessed  a  large  library  of  the  Fathers  of  the  Church  and  Anglican 
Divines.  He  had  daily  service,  fasted  from  meat  throughout 
Lent,  and  was  unmarried.  Some  rumour,  quite  unfounded,  got 
abroad  that  he  proposed  taking  to  himself  a  wife.  "  Ah, 
Parker,"  said  a  neighbour,  "  soon,  instead  of  thy  Fathers  thou 
shalt  have  children." 

Our  nearest  neighbour  at  Coryton,  distant  two  miles,  be- 
longed to  the  old  High  Church  school.  On  his  death  he  was 
succeeded  by  his  son,  who  at  once  instituted  daily  service  in  the 
church. 

I  may  go  back  somewhat  earlier  and  mention  a  circumstance 
that  happened  before  my  time,  which  at  all  events  shows  strong 
church  feeling  in  that  dead  period. 

Madam  Gould  of  Lew  Trenchard,  who  died  in  1795,  was  left 
a  widow  in  1766.  She  had  a  son,  a  spendthrift,  who  got  rid 
of  the  principal  family  property  at  Staverton,  and  would  have 
got  rid  of  Lew  Trenchard  as  well,  had  not  his  mother  secured 
it  by  a  lease  of  ninety-nine  years.  She  had  also  a  daughter 
married  to  Charles  Baring.  When  the  son  died,  in  1788,  Mrs. 
Baring  might  look  to  succeed  to  Lew  Trenchard  as  heiress.  Old 
Madam  drove  in  her  coach  to  Courtlands ,  near  Exmouth,  where 
lived  Charles  Baring  and  his  wife.  She  arrived  on  Saturday. 
Now  Mr.  Baring  had  his  religious  views,  like  the  rest  of  his 
family,  and  attended  a  conventicle  he  had  set  up  in  Limpstone. 
On  Sunday  morning  Mr.  Baring  took  his  mother-in-law  in  his 
chariot  to  the  chapel  instead  of  to  church.  She  sat  grim  and 
motionless  throughout  the  service,  and  silent  in  the  carriage 
on  the  return  to  Courtlands.    So  soon  as  she  was  in  the  hall,  she 


74 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


turned  on  her  son-in-law  and  said :  "  Charles,  order  my  coach 
round  at  once." 

"  But — we  are  about  to  sit  down  to  early  dinner." 

"  I  will  not  eat  with  you,  nor  visit  you  again.  I  leave  at 
once.  And,  Charles,  jnever  whilst  I  live  shall  you  set  foot  in 
Lew  House,  and  never  shall  you  or  Margaret  inherit  an  acre  there. 
I  shall  leave  everything  to  my  grandson  William." 

And  Charles  Baring  never  did  set  foot  in  Lew  House.  The 
old  lady  was  a  sturdy  Church  wo  man.  She  would  stand  up 
during  prayers  in  church  and  see  if  any  of  the  congregation 
failed  to  kneel ;  if  so,  such  persons  heard  of  it  from  her  in  the 
ensuing  week.  As  none  but  herself  and  the  clerk  in  the  congre- 
gation were  able  to  read,  the  latter  was  wont  to  give  out  the 
psalm  in  this  fashion  :  "  Let  Madam  and  I  sing  to  the  praise  and 
glory  of  God." 

"  Madam  "  was  a  sort  of  female  Sir  Roger  de  Coverley.  In 
the  Spectator  it  is  related  how  that  this  worthy  knight  "  keeps 
the  whole  congregation  in  order,  and  will  suffer  nobody  to  sleep 
in  it  but  himself  ;  for  if  by  chance  he  has  been  surprised  into 
a  short  nap  at  Sermon,  upon  recovering  out  of  it  he  stands  up 
and  looks  about  him,  and  if  he  sees  anybody  else  nodding,  either 
wakes  them  himself  or  sends  his  servant  to  them.  He  sometimes 
stands  up  when  everybody  else  is  on  their  knees,  to  count  the 
Congregation,  or  see  if  any  of  his  Tenants  are  missing.  ...  He 
has  often  told  me  that  at  his  coming  to  his  estate  he  found  his 
parishioners  very  irregular,  and  that  in  order  to  make  them 
kneel  and  join  in  the  responses,  he  gave  every  one  of  them  a 
hassock  and  a  Common  Prayer  Book,  and  at  the  same  time 
employed  an  itinerant  singing  master,  who  goes  about  the 
country  for  that  purpose,  to  instruct  them  rightly  in  the  tunes 
of  the  psalms." 

I  repeat  what  I  have  said  already,  that  notwithstanding 
every  effort  made  by  the  Crown  and  Prime  Ministers  of  the  day 
from  the  reign  of  William  of  Orange  to  far  on  in  that  of  Queen 
Victoria  to  deaden  the  Church  and  drive  orthodoxy,  if  not  wholly 
out  of  her,  yet  into  holes  and  corners  of  the  land,  there  remained 
a  large,  if  inactive,  Church  element.  In  books  of  Natural  Science 
published  at  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century,  we  were 
taught  that  in  metals,  minerals,  etc.,  existed  a  body  of  latent 
heat  that  might  well  remain  unsuspected,  because  unmanifested. 
A  little  friction  or  a  clash  would,  however,  bring  it  into  evidence. 
It  sufficed  to  strike  a  flint  with  steel  to  produce  a  spark,  the 


A  REMNANT 


75 


latent  heat  elicited  from  the  cold  silex.  There  was  throughout 
the  land  latent  Church  feeling,  not  among  the  clergy  alone,  but 
among  the  laity  as  well ;  and  all  required  was  a  sharp  stroke 
such  as  that  dealt  by  the  publication  of  the  Oxford  Tracts  to 
make  it  flash  light  everywhere,  in  towns,  in  villages,  in  colleges 
and  schools.  When  in  1827  Jonn  Keble  published  The  Christian 
Year,  it  was  hailed  everywhere  with  avidity.  It  passed  through 
edition  after  edition,  as  had  no  other  book.  It  found  its  way 
into  almost  every  parsonage,  and  into  every  house  where  any 
Church  feeling  existed.  Only  the  Evangelicals  looked  upon  it 
with  a  jealous  eye.  The  volume  could  not  have  sold  as  it  did, 
and  become  the  spiritual  food  of  thousands  of  souls,  had  there 
not  been  in  England  a  vast  amount  of  latent  Catholicism. 

There  was,  indeed,  in  most  Church  households  Nelson's  Festi- 
vals and  Fasts,  which  was  read  and  re-read,  but  that  was  mainly  in 
prose.1  Now  Fast  and  Festival  were  invested  with  the  glamour 
of  beautiful  poetry  that  carried  the  teaching  of  the  Christian  Year 
to  minds  hitherto  unconscious  of  its  significance. 

The  time  had  at  last  come  when  the  long-bound  and  down- 
trodden Orthodoxy  of  the  Church  was  to  show  itself. 

I  think  we  may  trace  an  analogy  between  the  fortunes  of  the 
English  Church  and  those  of  the  English  people.  The  old  Anglo- 
Saxon  stock  extended  through  every  shire  and  was  embedded 
in  every  parish  ;  it  had  become  lethargic,  un progressive,  and  its 
vitality  failing.  It  needed  the  infusion  of  fresh  blood  to  re- 
invigorate  it.  This  was  obtained  through  the  Norman  Conquest. 
The  remedy  was  desperate,  and  for  a  long  time  it  seemed  as 
though  the  inherent  strength  of  the  race  would  expire  under  such 
drastic  treatment.  English  institutions,  social  order,  genius, 
literature,  alike  disappeared  beneath  the  influx  of  French  fashions, 
culture  and  language,  only  slowly  to  re-emerge,  and  eventually 
to  assert  themselves  as  predominant  factors  in  every  department 
of  life,  retaining  but  a  trace  here  and  there  of  prolonged  foreign 
mastery,  in  our  tongue  and  in  our  manners. 

In  like  way  was  it  with  the  English  Church.  The  body  was 
sound  in  constitution,  in  orthodox  doctrine  ;  but  it  was  sub- 
merged for  awhile,  as  I  have  shown,  beneath  a  flood  of  Continental 
Zwinglianism  and  Calvinism,  in  the  reigns  of  Edward  VI  and 
Elizabeth.  Only  in  those  of  James  I  and  Charles  I  did  the  tops 
of  the  hills  appear,  to  be  again  engulfed  for  a  season.  But 
Puritanism  never  altered  the  substance,  the  contour  and  con- 
1  The  thirty-third  edition  was  issued  in  181 8. 


76 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


formation  of  the  English  Church,  however  greatly  it  may  have 
devastated  its  surface,  overlaid  it  with  a  film  of  slime,  not  without 
fertilizing  qualities  in  it,  and  strewn  it  with  wreckage. 

I  happen  to  live  where  the  sedimentary  rocks  have  been 
heaved  aloft,  contorted,  rent,  shattered,  and  in  places  metamor- 
phosed by  the  granite,  the  bed-rock  of  all,  spiring  into  lofty  tors. 

And  the  bed-rock  of  the  English  Church  has  been  its  primitive 
Catholic  and  Apostolic  constitution.  All  the  superimposed 
strata  of  novel  Continental  heresy  have  been  riven  and  dis- 
integrated, crumbling  down  into  beds  of  intractable,  sterile  clay. 
What  has  become  of  Calvinism  in  England  ?  Even  in  Presby- 
terian Scotland  it  is  dead  or  moribund.  But  with  us  in  England, 
the  imperishable  primary  rock  of  the  Faith  as  once  for  all 
delivered  to  the  Saints,  Catholic  worship,  and  Apostolic  order, 
remain  in  their  integrity.  When  we  would  build,  on  that  we 
lay  our  foundation.  We  hew  it  for  the  corner-stone  of  every 
structure  ;  of  this  primeval  material  are  the  blocks  fashioned 
into  which  we  drive  the  crooks  on  which  every  hinge  of  our 
spiritual  and  moral  life  turns.  Of  the  late-deposited  strata — so 
modern  that  they  are  not  more  than  three  and  a  half  centuries 
old — we  can  utilize  only  such  as  have  been  transformed — crys- 
tallized— by  contact  with  the  primary  rock,  and  have  thereby 
acquired  consistency  and  durability. 

Antiochus  Epiphanes  resolved  on  Hellenising  the  Jewish 
people  and  assimilating  their  religion  to  that  of  the  Greeks.  He 
was  greatly  assisted  in  his  work  by  apostate  Levites  and  the 
High  Priests,  Jason  and  Menelaus.  In  December  168  B.C.,  the 
enclosure  was  broken  down  between  the  outer  and  the  inner  courts 
of  the  Temple,  and  a  Grecian  cippus  was  placed  on  the  platform 
of  Zerubbabel's  altar  and  dedicated  to  the  Olympian  Zeus.  The 
profanation  was  consummated  by  introducing  a  herd  of  swine 
and  slaughtering  them  in  the  sacred  precincts.  From  that  hour 
the  daily  sacrifice  ceased,  the  sacred  fire  was  extinguished,  and 
the  faithful  Israelites  fled  from  the  dishonoured  Temple. 

At  the  time  commemorated  in  the  Book  of  Daniel  the  Abomina- 
tion of  Desolation  ceased,  Antiochus  was  dead,  his  generals  and 
armies  had  been  routed,  and  after  the  battle  of  Bethzur  in  165 
B.C.,  the  Jews  were  able  to  undertake  the  purification  of  God's 
House.  The  gates  had  been  consumed  with  fire,  the  altar  over- 
thrown, and  the  platform  was  overgrown  with  nettles.  The 
faithful  people  and  such  of  the  priests  as  had  remained  true  set 
to  work  to  restore  and  to  cleanse.    The  holy  fire,  if  we  may  trust 


A  REMNANT 


77 


the  Second  Book  of  Maccabees,  was  discovered  in  a  pit  where  it 
had  been  hidden.  The  Temple  was  re-dedicated,  and  again  the 
altar  smoked  and  the  lights  burned. 

Something  much  like  this  occurred  in  the  English  Church. 
From  the  time  when  William  III  landed  in  Tor  Bay,  through 
the  Whig  administration  of  the  early  days  of  Anne,  through 
the  long  period  of  Whig  prime  ministers,  from  1714  to  1770, 
during  the  twenty  years  when  Walpole  was  prime  minister, 
through  the  Peel,  Palmerston  and  Russell  domination,  the 
Government  laboured  to  Protestantize  the  Church  of  England, 
now  in  the  direction  of  Evangelicalism,  then  in  that  of  Religious 
Indifference. 

But  with  the  publication  of  the  Tracts  for  the  Times,  from  every 
quarter  men  started  up,  shook  off  their  torpor,  and  began  to 
rebuild  the  Temple  of  God.  The  fire — the  sacred  fire — was 
kindled  in  ten  thousand  hearts,  and  flamed  in  the  House  of  God. 
Although  the  progress  of  restoration  might  be  slow,  halting, 
and  hampered,  it  never  was  wholly  given  over.  The  reign  of  the 
Abomination  of  Desolation  was  at  an  end. 

"  Populus  qui  sedebat  in  tenebris  vidit  lucem  magnam :  etseden- 
tibus  in  regione  umbrce  mortis  lux  orta  est  eis."    (Matt.  iv.  16.) 


CHAPTER  IV 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT 

AS  I  have  already  pointed  out,  a  foreign  element,  as  by 
a  hypodermic  injection,  had  been  introduced  into  the 
blood  of  the  English  Church,  predisposing  it  for  the 
outbreak  of  an  Evangelical  epidemic.  That  epidemic 
was  Calvinistic,  not  Arminian,  for  the  very  good  reason  that  it 
was  Calvinism  which  had  entered  the  Church  from  the  Puritan 
Conformists,  the  French  Huguenots,  the  Dutch,  the  Scottish  and 
Irish  invaders.  The  sons  and  grandsons  of  all  these  men  may 
have  conformed,  but  the  old  Predestinarianism  ran  curdling  in 
their  arteries.  It  did  not  at  once  reveal  itself.  It  lay  dormant. 
For  awhile  it  remained  incubating.  It  was  bound  eventually 
to  manifest  itself. 

The  old  Puritan  party  had  become  disintegrated. 
A  major  portion  had  conformed,  as  we  have  seen  ;  it  had  lost 
all  its  vehemence  and  vitality  in  so  doing,  and  constituted,  in 
the  reign  of  William  III  and  during  the  Hanoverian  period,  the 
bed  of  Latitudinarianism  in  the  Established  Church ;  whereas 
the  sincere  Puritans  formed  Nonconformist  bodies,  Calvinistic 
or  Unitarian. 

As  to  true  Evangelicalism — real  spiritual  converse  with  God — 
that  had  never  lacked  in  the  English  Church.  It  had  been 
manifest  in  the  saintly  Andre wes,  in  Nicholas  Ferrar,  George 
Herbert,  Vaughan  the  Silurist,  in  Ken,  in  Nelson,  and  in  Law. 

But  the  modern  Evangelical  party  in  the  Church  was  started 
by  the  preaching  of  Wesley  ;  it  speedily  altered  its  direction  from 
Arminianism  to  Calvinism.  It  owed  its  real  origin,  Orion-like, 
to  the  united  operation  of  Scottish,  Dutch  and  Huguenot  in- 
vaders. 

The  English  Bishops  and  clergy  have  been  often  and  unjustly 
accused  of  having  thrust  Wesley  and  his  followers  out  of  the 
Church.  But  it  was  impossible  to  allow  the  Methodist  doctrines 
of  sensible  and  instantaneous  conversion,  personal  assurance, 
and  indefectability  to  find  a  lodgment  within  the  Church. 

78 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT  79 


Let  us  see  shortly  what  were  the  fundamental  doctrines  of 
Calvin  j  and  I  will  take  for  the  purpose  the  Lambeth  Articles  : 

(1)  From  all  Eternity  God  had  predestinated  some  to  life 
eternal,  others  to  be  cast  into  he  11- fire. 

(2)  The  efficient  cause  of  predestination  to  life  eternal  is 
wholly  independent  of  a  man's  faith,  good  works,  perseverance. 
It  exists  solely  in  the  determination  of  God. 

(3)  There  exists  a  limited,  foreknown  number  of  those  who  are 
to  be  saved. 

(4)  Those  who  are  not  thus  fore-ordained  will  be  lost  eternally. 

(5)  The  elect  can  never  lose  a  justifying  faith. 

(6)  The  elect  are  made  conscious  by  assurance  in  their  hearts 
that  they  are  destined  to  eternal  life. 

(7)  Grace  is  not  given  outside  this  limited  number  of  the  elect 
to  enable  others  to  be  saved. 

(8)  All  men  are  not  drawn  by  the  Father  to  come  to  the  Son 
to  be  saved. 

(9)  It  is  not  placed  in  the  will  or  power  of  any  man  to  be 
saved. 

That  this  terrible  doctrine  was  one  stantis  vel  cadentis  ecclesice 
Calvini  appears  from  the  story  of  Barneveldt  and  Grotius  in  the 
Netherlands.  These  men,  who  were  at  the  head  of  the  Estates 
of  Holland,  in  order  to  mitigate  the  severity  of  the  Calvinistic 
doctrine,  attempted  to  impose  on  all  the  ministers  a  command 
to  teach  "  that  God  has  created  no  man  in  order  to  damn  him  ; 
that  God  has  not  laid  man  under  a  necessity  of  sinning ;  and 
that  He  invites  no  man  to  be  saved  to  whom  He  has  resolved 
to  deny  salvation."  This  roused  stubborn  resistance.  Maurice 
of  Nassau,  the  Stadtholder  of  the  United  Provinces,  a  bitter 
and  unscrupulous  man,  and  of  immoral  life,  set  himself  at  the 
head  of  the  Calvinistic  party,  brought  Barneveldt  to  the  block, 
and  Grotius  to  imprisonment  that  was  to  have  been  for  life,  only 
he  managed  to  escape  in  a  book-box  and  fly  to  Paris. 

Such  then  are  the  doctrines  which  the  Puritan  party  strove 
to  import  into  the  English  Church,  and  which  the  Divines  under 
James  I  and  Charles  I  refused  to  entertain  and  allow  a  lodging 
within  the  covers  of  the  Prayer  Book.  And  it  was  these  doc- 
trines that  were  re-introduced  at  the  close  of  the  eighteenth 
century  by  the  Evangelical  preachers. 

The  low  condition,  the  small  vitality  of  the  Church,  prepared 
the  way  for  such  an  appearance  as  that  of  pseudo-Evangelicalism. 
It  is  so  in  the  human  body:  when  the  health  is  feeble,  the  pulse 


80 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


low,  and  the  brain  torpid,  then  it  is  that  the  extraneous  humours 
that  have  been  imported  into  the  blood  come  to  the  surface. 

I  knew  a  case  of  a  girl  who  had  swallowed  a  paper  of  pins.  For 
years  she  suffered  great  inconvenience  and  discomfort,  but  even- 
tually they  all  worked  out  and  she  became  robust  and  healthy. 

And  so  it  was  with  the  Anglican  Church :  she  had  endured 
much  through  the  amount  of  alien  matter  that  had  been  imported, 
even  forced  into  her.  It  is  to  be  trusted  that  eventually  she  will 
get  rid  of  it  altogether. 

We  should  be  doing  most  of  the  early  Evangelicals  a  great 
injustice  if  we  lumped  them  with  the  ultra- Calvinists.  They 
held  Calvinistic  doctrine  indeed,  but  in  a  very  modified  form,  and 
their  teaching  was  far  from  being  antinomian.  They  felt,  and 
expressed  a  great  truth,  that  the  Gospel  appealed  to  men's  hearts 
as  much  as,  if  not  more  than,  to  their  intellects.  Theirs  was  an 
emotional  religion,  and  the  cold  Latitudinarians  and  the  rigidly 
orthodox  abhorred  "  enthusiasm,"  by  which  they  meant  religious 
fervour.  These  men  had  no  thought  of  contravening  the  doc- 
trines of  the  Church ;  they  accepted  them  without  laying  stress 
upon  them ;  they  had  not  given  them  a  thought  j  they  hardly 
realized  what  they  were. 

We  must  clearly  distinguish  the  early  school  of  Evangelicals 
from  such  men  as  Toplady,  Whitefield  and  Romaine,  who  formed 
a  school  to  themselves  altogether  Calvinistic. 

Early  in  the  fourteenth  century  a  phase  of  Quietism  among  the 
monks  of  Mount  Athos  attracted  attention.  By  crouching  with 
heads  bowed  and  chins  resting  on  their  breasts,  contemplating 
their  navels  with  absorbed  attention,  they  conceived  that  they 
saw  the  ineffable  light  of  Tabor,  bathing  and  irradiating  their 
internal  organs.  This  light  became  to  them  an  instructing, 
guiding  and  overmastering  illumination. 

The  Evangelistic  movement  among  the  Churchmen  in  England, 
like  Pietism  in  Germany,  was  a  corresponding  religious  phase 
to  that  of  the  Omphalopsychae.  Instead  of  looking  to  the 
Church  and  its  teaching  for  guidance  in  the  spiritual  life,  they 
turned  their  eyes  inwards,  there  to  find  a  supreme  director  in 
faith  and  practice  ;  and  with  indifference  they  were  prepared  to 
burst  through  rule  and  order  in  obedience  to  the  inward  guide. 
Dr.  Dale  of  Birmingham  wrote  of  the  early  Evangelicals  : 

"  The  Evangelical  movement  encouraged  what  is  called  an 
undenominational  temper.  It  emphasized  the  vital  importance 
of  the  Evangelical  creed,  but  it  regarded  almost  with  indifference 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT  81 


all  forms  of  Church  polity  that  were  not  in  apparent  and  irre- 
concilable antagonism  to  that  creed.  It  cared  nothing  for  the 
idea  of  the  Church  as  the  august  society  of  saints.  It  was  the 
ally  of  individualism."  Further:  "  Although  its  leaders  insisted 
very  earnestly  on  the  obligation  of  individual  Christian  men  to 
live  a  devout  and  godly  life,  they  had  very  little  to  say  about  the 
relations  of  the  individual  Christian  to  the  general  order  of  human 
society,  or  about  the  realization  of  the  kingdom  of  God  in  all  the 
various  regions  of  human  activity.  The  Revival  had  no  great 
ideal  of  the  Church  as  a  divine  institution."  1  This  is  an  appre- 
ciation by  an  outsider,  a  Dissenter  ;  and  it  is  valuable. 

Put  but  a  little  water  in  a  spoon 
And  it  shall  be  as  all  the  ocean, 

said  the  Bastard  in  King  John,  and  this  applied  to  the  Evan- 
gelical movement.  The  Evangelicals  had  laid  hold  of  a  truth, 
a  valuable  truth,  but  it  was  only  as  "  a  little  water  in  a  spoon," 
and  they  magnified  it  to  be  "  as  all  the  ocean,"  the  whole  sum 
and  substance  of  Christianity. 

The  consequence  was  that  their  religion  was  of  a  miserably 
partial  quality,  not  partaking  of  the  fullness  of  the  spirituality 
that  is  found  among  Catholics,  English  or  Roman.  The  old 
teaching  of  Churchmen  was  the  duty  men  owed  to  God,  to 
their  country,  to  their  neighbours  and  to  themselves.  And  this 
teaching  has  left  its  mark  on  the  English  character.  We  hear 
of  a  nurse  in  a  burning  house,  who  will  sacrifice  herself,  and  that 
readily,  to  rescue  the  child  committed  to  her  charge,  of  an  engine- 
driver  who  will  devote  his  own  life  to  the  saving  of  the  passengers 
in  the  train,  and  of  the  captain  of  a  sinking  ship  who  will  see  crew 
and  passengers  safe  before  he  will  think  of  leaving  the  wreck. 

With  this,  Evangelical  doctrine  had  nothing  in  common.  In 
fact,  the  idea  of  Duty  was  scouted  by  the  Evangelicals.  "  Duty  ! 
duty  !  "  exclaimed  one  of  the  School  to  me — "  There  is  nothing 
in  the  Gospel  about  duty:  everything  is  performed  for  us." 
u  '  Well  done,  good  and  faithful  servant,'  "  I  replied,  " '  enter  thou 
into  the  joy  of  thy  Lord.'    Was  there  no  duty  done  there  ?  " 

What  is  very  significant  is  the  permanence  of  this  sense  in  the 
English  character,  impressed  on  it  by  the  old,  despised  orthodox 
clergy,  never  wholly  effaced  by  Low-Church  individualism. 

The  teaching  of  the  Orthodox  had  been  inadequate  and  in- 
complete.   The  prevailing  idea  among  all  classes  of  Church- 

1  Dale  (R.  M.),  The  Old  Evangelicalism  and  the  New  (London,  1889) 
pp.  17-18. 

6 


82 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


people  was  indeed  that  of  duty.  They  brought  their  children  to 
be  baptized  and  confirmed ;  they  attended  church  once  at  least 
on  a  Sunday,  because  they  conceived  that  it  was  their  duty  so 
to  do  j  they  communicated  monthly,  for  the  same  reason.  This 
may  be  fairly  taken  as  the  prevalent  conception  of  English 
Churchmen  as  to  what  was  expected  of  a  Christian,  and  would  lead 
to  Eternal  Life  ;  and  against  this  conception  the  Evangelicals 
waged  implacable  war. 

Doing  is  a  deadly  thing, 
And  doing  leads  to  death. 

This  was  their  doctrine  ;  turning  all  Christians  into  such  as 
the  rois  faineants  of  the  Franks,  who  sat  smiling  in  inward  com- 
placency, receiving  homage  and  tribute,  combing  their  yellow 
hair,  and  doing  nothing  either  royal  or  manly. 

The  teaching  of  the  orthodox  clergy  consisted  in  appeals  to 
the  reason  to  acknowledge  the  truth  of  the  Christian  religion,  and 
to  the  conscience  to  obey  its  precepts. 

This  was  well  and  necessary  ;  but  it  was  not  the  whole  Gospel. 
If  left  out  of  account  the  feelings,  and  it  is  out  of  the  heart  that 
man  believeth  unto  righteousness.  That  under  it  very  noble 
characters  were  formed,  high-minded,  honourable,  truthful, 
sincere,  is  absolutely  certain  ;  but  so  were  also  characters  formed 
under  the  teaching  of  the  heathen  philosophers. 

What  the  orthodox  failed  to  inculcate  was  that  man  is  invited 
to  fulfil  his  duties,  not  as  a  servant  to  a  master,  but  as  a  child  to  a 
father.  They  had  taught,  indeed,  that  man  was  redeemed  by  the 
death  of  Christ,  but  had  not  shown  how  that  the  death  of  Christ 
was  a  manifestation  of  the  love  of  God,  calling  for  reciprocation. 

It  was  to  fill  this  void  in  the  ordinary  predication  of  the  ortho- 
dox, that  the  Evangelicals  stepped  in.  They  insisted  on  the 
continuous  effects  of  the  death  of  Christ  ;  they  represented  the 
blood  as  an  ever-flowing  stream,  cleansing  the  sinner  from  every 
spot  and  stain,  and  rendering  him  henceforth  impeccable.  They 
sang — 

There  is  a  fountain  filled  with  blood 

Drawn  from  Immanuel's  veins  ; 
And  sinners,  plunged  beneath  that  flood, 

Lose  all  their  guilty  stains. 

And  the  mode  of  plunging  was  an  act  of  faith.  When  once 
cleansed  there  was  no  more  amenability  to  the  Law  ;  they  had 
received  a  complete  discharge  from  all  the  obligations  of  duty. 
Those  who  had  acquired  assurance  of  salvation,  according  to 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT  83 


the  teaching  of  these  Evangelicals,  were  supernaturally  born 
again,  and  knew  this  by  a  Divinely-given  perception  akin  to  a 
new  sense,  and  were  thereby  freed  from  indwelling  sin.  They 
could  not  sin — the  faculty  to  do  so  was  taken  from  them.  This, 
which  was  Wesley's  doctrine,  was  held  by  the  early  Evangelicals, 
but  it  soon  got  fused  with  Calvinism. 

A  recent  traveller  in  Armenia  states  that,  what  with  the 
pictures  of  bleeding  martyrs  in  Greek  churches,  and  especially 
the  preaching  and  howled-out  hymns  of  the  American  Protestant 
missions,  about  blood — blood — blood  !  the  Mussulmans  have 
acquired  an  impression  that  Christianity  is  a  sanguinary  creed. 
The  Salvation  Army  bears  on  its  banner  "  Blood  and  Fire." 

Stress  was  laid  by  the  Evangelicals  on  the  death  of  Christ, 
but  small  account  was  made  of  His  Life.  They  declared  that, 
however  exactly  men  might  discharge  their  obligations  to  God 
and  man,  nothing  of  this  availed — all  their  righteousness  was 
filthy  rags.  Now  it  is  true  enough  that  we  are  commanded  to 
account  ourselves  unprofitable  servants  when  we  have  done  all 
that  is  commanded  us,  but  we  are  nowhere  told  that  we  are  not 
held  responsible  for  our  acts.  Up  to  a  certain  point  the  teaching 
of  the  Evangelicals  supplemented  that  of  the  Orthodox,  but 
it  erred  in  superseding  it.  It  rendered  conscience  a  valueless 
faculty.  It  deprived  man  of  every  motive  for  resisting  tempta- 
tion ;  and  self-indulgence  was  fostered.  Everything  was  done 
for  us,  and  we  had  nothing  to  do  ourselves  but  to  accept.  Having 
no  particle,  no  fibre  of  good  in  us,  we  were  to  be  saved  by  the 
imputed  righteousness  of  Christ. 

Mr.  Mozley,  who  for  many  years  of  his  boyhood  and  early 
youth  sat  under  this  kind  of  preaching,  says  that  its  great  success 
lay  in  its  extreme  simplicity.  "  Simple  I  say  it  must  have  been, 
for  it  excluded  everything  else.  You  were  to  be  quite  sure 
not  only  that  you  had  received  a  special  revelation  that  Jesus 
Christ  died  for  you  in  particular,  but  also  that  your  salvation 
was  now  a  certainty,  so  as  to  place  you  above  all  further  anxiety. 
You  might  have  your  faults,  but  you  were  saved  ;  your  neigh- 
bours might  have  their  virtues,  but,  wanting  this  personal 
assurance,  they  were  not  saved.  They  were  not  even  one  step 
on  the  way  to  salvation.  The  impression  of  the  system  on  my 
mind,  after  many  years  of  such  sermons,  nay,  thousands  of  such 
sermons,  with  hardly  any  relief  whatever,  was  that  it  put  the 
character  of  Jesus  Christ  entirely  out  of  account,  and  that  it 
reduced  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  all  the  discourses  of  our 


84 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Lord,  and  all  the  moral  arguments  and  exhortations  of  S.  Paul 
and  other  Apostles,  to  mere  carnalities  that  no  real  Christian 
need  have  anything  to  do  with.  All  that  is  tender,  all  that  is 
touching,  all  that  appeals  to  our  higher  and  nobler  feelings,  all 
that  by  which  Jesus  Christ  is  the  object  of  unbounded  love  and 
adoration  even  to  those  who  shrink  from  the  attempt  to  fathom 
the  mystery  of  His  being,  was  thrust  aside — behind,  I  should 
rather  say,  trampled  upon,  as  likely  to  lead  us  astray  from  the 
real  point  at  issue,  viz.  whether  we  ourselves  are  personally  saved 
to  our  own  certain  knowledge." 1 

I  sent  a  daughter  once  to  a  cookery  school.  She  returned 
with  a  masterly  knowledge  how  to  make  marchpane,  almond 
paste,  but  could  do  nothing  else,  not  even  boil  a  potato.  Now 
marchpane  is  very  toothsome,  but  when  served  up  twice  a  day, 
and  every  day  in  every  year,  it  palls  on  the  appetite.  The  Cal- 
vinistic  Evangelicals  had  but  one  or  at  the  outside  two  doctrines, 
and  they  not  of  marchpane  daintiness.  On  the  other  hand, 
what  a  range  of  subjects  has  the  Churchman  to  dilate  on :  every 
fast  and  festival  furnishes  him  with  a  theme,  and  enables  him  to 
bring  to  light  different  and  complementary  verities. 

The  Evangelicals  persistently  dwelt  on  the  utter  helplessness 
and  hopeless  depravity  of  human  nature.  Fallen  man  was 
corrupt  to  the  core  ;  no  act  of  his,  however  generous,  merciful 
and  just,  that  was  not  cankered,  and  to  be  regarded  as  worthless 
and  reprobate  in  the  sight  of  God. 

That  this  teaching  produced  smugness  and  self-righteousness 
in  those  who  regarded  themselves  as  among  the  elect  goes  without 
saying. 

The  Mussulmans  have  an  account  of  the  creation  of  man  that 
tallies  exactly  with  the  tenets  of  Calvin.  They  say  that  Allah 
was  sitting  on  His  throne,  and  He  took  up  two  lumps  of  clay,  one 
in  the  right  and  the  other  in  the  left  hand,  moulded  them  into 
living  men,  and  cast  them  right  and  left.  "  This  goes  to  Heaven 
— and  what  care  I  ?  And  this  goes  to  hell — and  what  care  I  ?  " 
Burns  satirised  the  Calvinism  of  the  Scotch  in  "  Holy  Willie 

O  Thou  who  in  the  heavens  dost  dwell, 
Who,  as  it  pleases  best  thysel', 
Sends  me  to  heaven,  and  ten  to  hell 

A'  for  Thy  glory, 
And  no  for  unco  guid  or  ill 

They've  done  afore  Thee. 

1  Reminiscences,  i.  188. 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT  85 


The  Almighty,  according  to  the  Calvinist  and  Mussulman 
Creeds,  is  an  arbitrary  and  capricious  tyrant.  And  one  conse- 
quence of  the  preaching  of  the  Evangelicals  and  the  Calvinistic 
Methodists  was  the  fits  of  terrible,  agonizing  despair  into  which 
men  and  women  were  cast,  through  supposing  they  had  been 
foreordained  from  all  Eternity  to  hell-fire,  that  God  had  created 
them,  brought  them  into  the  world  and  nourished  them  therein, 
for  the  purpose  of  serving  as  fuel  in  the  everlasting  burning. 

Children,  brought  up  under  Calvinistic  teaching,  imbibed  a 
conception  of  the  Almighty,  as  though  He  were  like  the  ogre 
in  a  fairy  tale,  who  fattens  up  little  boys  and  girls  in  a  cage  for 
his  eating.    They  looked  on  Him  with  terror,  not  with  love. 

Shakespeare  points  to  the  doctrine  of  predestination  so  widely 
preached  in  his  day,  when  in  Measure  for  Measure  he  makes 
Claudio  say  : 

The  words  of  Heaven — 
On  whom  it  will,  it  will  ;  on  whom  it  will  not, — so  ; 
—Yet  still  'tis  just  ! 

The  preachers  not  only  denounced  flagrant  sin,  but  also  with 
equal  energy  what  they  termed  "  the  World  "  :  balls,  races, 
theatres,  cards,  even  though  no  money  passed ;  novels,  except 
such  as  were  religious — in  fact  all  amusements  ;  they  looked 
askance  at  cricket,  and  with  horror  at  football. 

Only  such  as  had  the  required  assurance  were  regarded  as 
Christians  ;  all  outside  this  narrow  clique  were  lumped  together 
as  Worldlings.  The  Elect  pretended  at  a  glance  or  a  word  to  be 
able  to  classify  a  man  as  predestined  to  glory  or  to  hell-fire. 
Extremes  meet.  S.  Bridget  of  Sweden  declared  that  she  could 
always  detect  a  sinner  by  his  malodour,  and  even  distinguish 
his  special  form  of  vice  by  the  peculiar  stench.  A  writer  of  the 
period  (R.  Graves),  describing  Whitefield's  preaching,  says  : 
"  He  usually  made  choice  of  a  different  text  at  each  meeting,  but 
whatever  the  subject  was,  it  always  ended — like  Cato's  speeches 
in  the  Senate-house,  with  delenda  est  Carthago — with  Down  with 
your  good  works  !  with  a  denunciation  against  self-righteousness, 
and  a  recommendation  of  Faith  alone  in  its  stead — as  if  virtue 
was  inconsistent  with  belief  in  the  Gospel ;  though  Chillingworth 
observed,  '  This  doctrine  of  renouncing  their  own  righteousness 
has  been  generally  found  most  agreeable  to  those  who  have  no 
righteousness  of  their  own  to  renounce.'  Mr.  Whitefield  said 
little  about  repentance,  but  laid  all  the  stress  upon  faith  alone ; 


86 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


so  that  if  a  man  was,  or  fancied,  or  even  said,  that  he  was  pos- 
sessed of  true  faith,  he  was  immediately  pronounced  a  convert, 
and  whether  he  reformed  his  life  or  not,  became  a  saint  upon 
easy  terms." 

William  Romaine  was  for  awhile  curate  of  Lew  Trenchard, 
but  so  small  a  parish  and  such  simple  country  folk  did  not  afford 
him  the  scope  he  desired.  He  became  a  lecturer  at  S.  Dunstan's- 
in-the-West,1  and  principal  adviser  of  Lady  Huntingdon.  In  his 
teaching,  Calvinism  was  pressed  to  its  ultimate  term.  Believers 
were  assured  that  they  were  not  bound  to  keep  "  the  law  "  in 
order  to  be  saved.  "  Remember,  thou  art  not  required  to  obey 
in  order  to  be  saved  for  thine  obedience,  but  thou  art  already 
saved."  Final  perseverance,  and  the  impossibility  of  a  believer 
falling  from  Grace  whatsoever  his  acts  might  be,  was  promi- 
nently enforced.  One  of  the  "  chosen  vessels  "  being  drunk, 
tumbled  out  of  a  cart  and  broke  his  leg.  The  pastor  on  hearing 
of  the  accident  exclaimed,  "  Oh  what  a  blessed  thing  it  is  that 
he  can't  fall  out  of  the  Covenant !  " 

The  saner  Evangelicals  always  qualified  their  teaching  about  a 
saving  faith  by  insisting  that  a  true  faith  must  manifest  itself 
in  a  good  life,  and  that  to  boast  of  faith  and  live  an  immoral  life 
was  a  self-delusion.  This,  of  course,  is  wholesome  and  true 
doctrine. 

But  among  Dissenters,  where  no  qualification  was  added,  it 
led  to  most  disastrous  results — it  entirely  dissociated  morals  from 
religion.  When  Dr.  Benson  was  appointed  to  Truro,  he  was 
horrified  at  the  immorality  of  the  Cornish,  coupled  with  loud 
profession  of  being  in  a  "  saved  state."  "  The  confusion  of 
sensual  excitement  with  religious  passion  is  awful,"  he  wrote. 
"  The  immoralities  of  revivals  simply  appalling." 

That  the  Evangelical  party,  with  their  doctrines,  was  adven- 
titious, and  did  not  spring  out  of  the  Church  herself,  is  fully 
recognized  by  Dr.  Stoughton  in  his  Religion  in  England  under 
Queen  Anne  and  the  Georges  (ii.  93).  11  The  Evangelical  leaders 
of  theology  were  disciples  of  the  Puritans.  They  leaped  back 
over  a  hundred  years  to  get  at  the  time  of  Goodwin  and  Owen, 
Baxter  and  Howe,  Bates  and  Charnock,  Gurnall  and  Flavel. 

1  This  was  an  instance  of  the  mischievous  nature  cf  the  Lectureships 
founded  by  the  Puritans  before  the  Rebellion.  Romaine  had  been 
appointed  by  the  Trustees.  The  rector  disputed  his  right  to  occupy 
the  pulpit.  The  churchwardens  refused  to  light  the  church,  and  to 
open  the  doors  till  the  very  moment  that  the  lecture  was  commencing. 
The  case  was  brought  before  the  King's  Bench,  and  judgment  was  given 
in  favour  of  the  Trustees  and  Romaine. 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT 


87 


The  doctrines  of  Redemption  and  Justification  by  Faith,  of  the 
Work  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  were  zealously  embraced.  The  wells, 
next  to  those  of  the  Bible,  whence  the  Evangelicals  drew  their 
inspiration,  were  not  Patristic,  not  Anglo-Catholic,  but  they 
were  Protestant  works  of  the  sixteenth  and  Nonconformist 
works  of  the  seventeenth  century.' '  That  is  to  say,  the  Calvin- 
istic  party  was  an  eruption  of  suppressed  Puritanism,  altogether 
alien  to  the  faith  and  practice  of  the  Church. 

The  first  Evangelicals  were  a  class  to  themselves.  They  were, 
after  a  fashion,  loyal  Churchmen,  held  the  doctrines  of  Baptismal 
Regeneration  and  the  Real  Presence,  though  not  in  as  crisp  and 
pronounced  a  form  as  did  the  Tract arians.  They  represented 
the  rise  of  Spiritual  Life  above  the  deadness  of  ordinary  Church- 
manship  in  their  day.  They  brought  their  hearers  to  the  foot 
of  the  Cross,  but  it  was  to  stand  there  stunned  and  inert.  The 
taint  of  Calvinism  had  not  as  yet  entered  deep  into  their  theo- 
logical system.  They  ministered  faithfully  and  truly  to  their 
flocks,  and  were  men  of  prayer  in  their  closets,  and  not,  like 
the  later  Evangelicals,  blatant  on  platforms. 

Some  were  like  John  Fletcher  of  Madeley,  who  laboured  like 
an  apostle  among  the  Shropshire  colliers.  He  was  a  Swiss, 
and  had  been  trained  for  the  Calvinist  pastorate  in  his  native 
land.  His  real  name  was  De  la  Flechere.  Some  were  like  the 
Scotts,  whose  clerical  life  was  laborious,  and  passed,  as  it  were, 
in  the  shade. 

Earnest  men  of  the  older  Evangelicals  were  rather  influenced 
by  Wesley — who,  as  is  well  known,  looked  with  repugnance  on 
separation  from  the  Church,  and  who  sought  the  infusion  of 
spirituality  into  a  presumedly  moribund  body,  and  hated  Cal- 
vinism. William  Wilberforce,  the  father  of  the  Bishop,  belonged 
to  the  primitive  Evangelicals.  A  more  saintly  soul  never  lived 
in  the  English  Church  than  Henry  Venn.  His  absolute  faith  in 
the  Incarnation,  his  fervent  love  of  Christ,  his  urgency  of  the 
means  of  grace,  mark  him  out  as  an  Evangelical  of  the  better 
type.  But  he  had  no  conception  of  what  the  Church  was,  and 
when  he  quitted  Yorkshire  his  congregation  lapsed  into  Dissent. 
His  son,  John  Venn  of  Clapham,  if  not  quite  equal  to  his  father, 
was  also  a  most  zealous  and  holy  man.  At  Clapham  his  Lenten 
Lectures  were  specially  devoted  to  the  moral  and  religious 
improvement  of  the  younger  part  of  his  flock.  He  shared  in 
the  establishment  of  a  local  Bible  Society,  and  was  one  of  the 
founders  of  the  Church  Missionary  Society.     But  his  most 


88 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


noted  characteristic  was  humility,  and  at  the  last  it  was  his 
earnest  and  particular  wish  that  nothing  should  be  recorded 
of  him  in  the  way  of  panegyric.  On  reading  his  sermons  one 
cannot  fail  to  be  struck  with  the  soundness  of  his  theology. 
His  sermon  on  the  "  Communion  of  Saints  99  is  excellent,  only 
just  stopping  short  of  Communion  in  prayer. 

There  was  in  my  own  neighbourhood  one  of  the  true  repre- 
sentatives of  the  early  Evangelicals.  He  had  but  a  small 
vicarage  in  which  to  live  ;  his  wife  was  stone-deaf,  and  he  had 
a  large  family  of  very  noisy  children  who  pervaded  the  house. 
On  one  side  of  the  parsonage  was  a  grove,  in  spring  a  sheet  of 
snowdrops  j  this  was  his  study,  his  oratory  and  place  of  medita- 
tion ;  for  here  alone  was  he  free  from  the  racket  in  the  house. 
Here,  in  fine  weather  and  in  foul,  in  rain  and  snow,  and  when 
the  sun  strewed  the  sward  with  flakes  of  gold,  the  old  man  paced 
up  and  down,  his  lips  murmuring  in  prayer,  or  with  a  far-off  gaze, 
looking  into  the  mysteries  of  God,  preparing  his  Sunday  dis- 
courses. He  served  two  churches  three  miles  apart,  and  had 
in  consequence  to  take  three  services  every  Lord's  Day.  He 
was  an  earnest  and  powerful  preacher,  but  had  only  rustics  to 
listen  to  him.  In  his  humble  soul  he  was  content  with  that,  and 
had  no  aspiration  to  occupy  a  pulpit  in  a  fashionable  watering- 
place. 

But  it  was  with  few,  very  few  of  the  representatives  of  the 
early  Evangelicals  that  I  was  brought  into  contact.  The 
breed  rapidly,  indeed  suddenly,  deteriorated  ;  and  this  was 
due  to  a  large  extent  to  their  adoption  of  Calvinism.  What  a 
blight  John  Newton  cast  on  the  genius  of  Cowper  !  Newton 
had  been  a  blaspheming  slave-dealer.  He  was  converted  and 
became  a  black  fanatic. 

Most  of  the  Evangelicals  whom  I  met  and  knew  were  formal ; 
and  smugness  was  the  badge  of  all  their  tribe.  They  were  all, 
without  exception,  men  of  very  narrow  views.  Religion  with 
them  was  subjective,  emotional,  concentrated  on  self.  "  All  you 
care  for,"  as  some  one  said  to  Clayton  of  Cambridge,  "  is  the 
saving  of  your  own  dirty  little  soul."  They  conceived  of  God 
in  no  other  capacity  than  that  of  being  engaged  over  individuals, 
like  a  scientist  examining,  feeding  and  providing  for  animalcules, 
and  unconcerned  about  creation  at  large.  Of  worship  they 
had  no  conception  at  all.  We  hear  a  good  deal  of  the  Romish 
priest  occupying  the  place  of  God,  intervening  between  the 
human  soul  and  God ;  but  it  has  always  struck  me  that  in  no 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT  89 


form  of  Christianity  does  man  so  poke  himself  into  prominence, 
and  stand  in  the  light,  and  throw  his  ugly  shadow  over  the  soul, 
as  in  Protestantism,  where  the  preacher  is  all  in  all,  and  the 
worship  of  God  is  nowhere.  Henri  Quatre  once  said  to  a  pastor, 
"  I  had  rather  be  with  my  God  for  one  quarter  of  an  hour,  than 
hear  a  fellow  talk  about  Him  for  an  hour  and  a  half."  Common 
Prayer,  the  Eucharist  especially,  were  disregarded  as  acts  of 
worship  and  treated  as  adjuncts  to  the  sermon.  I  spoke  once 
on  Daily  Prayer  to  a  clergyman  of  this  school.  He  did  not  see 
any  good  in  it  unless  it  led  up  to  a  sermon.1 

The  very  position  of  the  Catholic  priest  is  significant.  He 
kneels  or  stands  facing  East  at  the  head  of  his  flock,  like  a 
shepherd  leading  to  God.  But  the  Protestant  pastor  confronts 
his  congregation,  to  bluster,  or,  if  he  wants  their  money,  to 
cajole. 

From  the  Evangelical  point  of  view  the  Church  was  the  king- 
dom of  the  Elect,  known  only  to  one  another.  As  a  body  the 
Evangelicals  opposed  the  revival  of  Convocation  and  of  Diocesan 
Synods.  When  some  of  them  became  Colonial  Bishops  they 
were  helpless,  they  could  wag  their  tongues,  but  put  no  hands 
to  work.  Hands  efficient  for  any  constructive  work  they  had  not , 
only  fins  wherewith  to  propel  themselves  into  notice — and  to 
muddy  the  water  in  which  they  swam. 

The  contrast  presented  between  the  two  provinces  of  Australia 

and  South  Africa  bears  out  this  assertion.   The  former  had  been 

for  long  ruled  mainly  by  Low  Churchmen  j  in  consequence  there 

was  no  cohesion  at  one  time  between  the  different  dioceses,  and 

Churchmanship  everywhere  is  still  at  a  low  ebb.    In  the  latter 

the  decided  teaching  of  the  metropolitans  of  Cape  Town  and  their 

suffragans  has  borne  fruit  in  the  vigour  of  the  Church  at  large, 

and  its  activity  in  propagating  the  Gospel,  as  tract  after  tract 

of  that  huge  continent  has  come  under  English  influence.  And 

this  in  spite  of  trials  arising  from  continued  warfare  with  natives 

and  Dutch  settlers,  and  the  schismatic  action  of  Bishop  Colenso. 

The  secret  lies  in  the  fact  that  the  South  African  bishops  realized 

the  corporate  character  of  the  Church,  and  acted  on  this  belief  ; 

and  this  the  early  Australian  prelates  with  but  few  exceptions 

did  not  understand.    But  there  were  difficulties  to  be  met  in 

Australia,  though  not  greater  than  those  encountered  in  South 

1  What  the  Evangelical  never  understood  was  the  difference  between 
preaching  and  teaching.  The  office  of  the  priest  is  to  preach  to  the 
practically  heathen  and  call  to  the  truth,  and  then  to  teach,  or  build  up 
in  the  Faith  and  the  practice  of  the  Christian  duties. 


90 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Africa.  South  Australia  was  founded  seventy  years  ago  as  an 
avowed  Congregational  settlement,  in  which  Churchmanship 
was  a  barrier  to  material  prosperity.  Of  the  population  a  good 
number  were  the  descendants  of  convicts,  and  there  were  to  be 
found  among  the  settlers  German  Lutherans  and  Moravians, 
Roman  Catholic  Irish,  Scottish  Presbyterians,  Russian  Greeks, 
also  Poles,  Chinese,  Kanakas,  Japanese,  Javaneseand  Aboriginals. 
The  distances  to  be  traversed  were  enormous.  The  Archbishop 
of  Sydney  some  time  ago  took  occasion  to  pay  a  visit  to  his 
brother  at  Perth.  Now  the  Bishop  of  West  Australia  has  a 
diocese  extending  over  near  on  four  thousand  miles,  and  he 
thought  right  to  turn  back  from  a  Confirmation  tour  to  meet 
his  Primate  at  Albany.  As  they  clasped  hands,  the  Archbishop 
said  :  "  Well,  my  dear  Bishop,  I  have  come  two  thousand  miles 
to  see  you."  "  Aye,"  answered  he  of  Perth  ;  "  and  I  have 
travelled  four  thousand  miles  in  my  own  diocese  to  meet  you." 

Ubi  probus  est  architectus, 
Bene  lineatam  si  semel  carinam  collocavit, 
Facile  est  navem  facere,  ubi  fundata  et  constituta  est. 

The  South  African  bishops  could  well  say,  with  Periplectomenes  : 

Nunc  haec  carina  satis  profundata  bene  et  statuta  est. 

Plaut.,  Miles  Glor.,  iii.  3. 

A  great  point  of  Evangelical  insistence  was  the  verbal  in- 
spiration and  infallibility  of  Scripture.  These  men  could  not 
realize  that  the  Old  Testament  was  written  to  give  us  an  aspect 
of  human  history  as  seen  from  above,  in  contradistinction  to 
secular  history,  which  sees  all  from  below  and  misses  the  guiding 
hand  of  God.  The  overstraining  of  this  doctrine  has  had 
disastrous  consequences.  J.  Anthony  Froude's  book  The 
Nemesis  of  Faith,  published  in  1849,  shows  how  this  accounted 
for  the  shipwreck  of  many  faiths.  "  Perhaps  the  world  has 
never  witnessed  any  more  grotesque  idol  worship  than  what  has 
resulted  from  it  in  modern  Bibliolatry." 

Although  the  Evangelicals  insisted  on  verbal  inspiration, 
they  were  too  blind  to  see  that  their  system  was  condemned 
root  and  branch  by  Scripture.  In  their  scheme  the  Beatitudes 
had  no  place,  and  their  denunciation  of  good  works  was  con- 
trary to  the  teaching  of  Our  Lord  as  to  the  blessing  pronounced 
at  the  Last  Day  on  such  as  had  done  works  of  mercy.  How 
could  they  explain  away  the  saying  about  giving  a  cup  of  cold 
water — that  it  should  meet  with  reward  ?  Mr.  Swinburne  in  his 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT  91 


Memories  of  a  School  Inspector  mentions  a  sermon  that  he  him- 
self heard  from  an  Evangelical  divine  on  the  text  "  Not  every- 
one that  saith  unto  me  Lord  !  Lord  !  shall  enter  into  the  Kingdom 
of  heaven,  but  he  that  doeth  the  will,  etc."  And  his  sermon  was 
to  show  the  precise  contrary.  It  was  a  violent  attack  upon 
such  persons  as  urged  that  faith  must  be  evidenced  by  works  ; 
"  words,"  said  he,  "  were  all  the  necessary  evidence  of  inner 
faith — acts  were  naught.  Passive  faith,"  he  argued,  "was 
action  of  the  highest  kind." 

That  the  Church  of  Rome  was  Babylon  and  the  Pope  Anti- 
christ, with  these  men  admitted  of  no  question.  Newman 
shows  us  how  steeped  his  mind  had  been  in  that  conviction,  and 
it  was  the  reiterated  denunciation  of  Rome  which  conduced 
largely  to  conversions.  Men  who  had  had  it  impressed  on  them 
that  the  Roman  Church  was  the  Scarlet  Whore,  when  they 
travelled  abroad  and  came  in  contact  with  good  Papists,  and  saw 
how  much  more  religion  existed  in  Catholic  lands  than  among 
Protestants,  what  a  living  faith  was  possessed  by  Catholics,  how 
sweet  and  beautiful  were  their  lives,  then  their  prepossessions 
fell,  and  they  rushed  into  the  contrary  extreme,  exclaiming  that 
their  former  teachers  had  been  false  guides  and  lying  prophets. 
The  majority  of  those  who  "  went  over  "  had  been,  like  Newman, 
Faber  and  Oakeley,  Sibthorpe,  Manning,  Dodsworth,  the  two 
Wilberforces,  and  Allies,  trained  in  Evangelicalism ;  whereas 
those  who  had  been  brought  up  on  Church  principles,  like  Keble, 
Pusey  and  Isaac  Williams,  remained  unshaken.1 

The  Evangelical  clergy,  as  already  said,  made  preaching  the 
end  of  everything,  and  for  the  sake  of  that  every  other  obligation 
must  be  set  aside.  They  were  to  be  seen  scampering  about  the 
country,  away  from  their  parishes,  to  mount  strange  pulpits, 
harangue  on  platforms,  and  gush  in  prayer  meetings. 

Simeon,  the  great  luminary  of  the  school,  was  a  most  worthy 
man.  He  took  the  poorly  endowed  living  of  Holy  Trinity  at 
Cambridge  that  he  might  use  its  pulpit  as  a  rostrum  whence  to 
pour  forth  his  doctrine.    He  died  in  1836.    So  great  was  his 

1  Of  the  fourteen  writers  of  the  Tracts  for  the  Times,  only  one,  Newman, 
seceded.  Ambrose  Phillipps  de  Lisle  wrote  :  "A  grave  warning  to  all 
teachers  and  controversialists,  the  immense  and  incalculable  harm  that 
was  done  to  me  by  the  prejudiced,  ignorant,  and  inaccurate  notions  of 
Romanism  which  I  had  heard  in  talk,  or  had  presented  to  me  in  silly 
tracts,  in  partisan  histories,  in  evangelical  fiction,  and  in  other  bad  and 
foolish  literature  of  these  kinds.  ...  It  was  the  recoil  from  the  Protestant 
libels  and  misstatements  which  drew  me  at  last  into  the  Papal  Church." — 
National  Review  (May  1900),  p.  489. 


92 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


devotion  to  his  work  that  he  resigned  his  rights  to  a  family 
property,  and  persuaded  his  elder  brother  to  leave  it  to  another. 

Nevertheless  he  disregarded  his  parochial  duties  ;  he  passed 
over  the  whole  pastoral  work  to  Robinson,  afterwards  Arch- 
deacon ;  this  latter,  in  his  turn,  and  for  precisely  the  same 
reason  (viz.  a  feeling  that  his  calling  lay  in  the  pulpit  rather 
than  by  the  sick-bed),  transferred  the  entire  pastoral  duty  to 
a  third  clergyman.  But  he,  also,  preferred  talking  to  acting, 
and  little  relishing  having  to  visit  the  poor  and  comfort  the 
dying,  with  a  small  gratuity  handed  over  the  charge  to  a  lay- 
man, a  very  humble  member  of  one  of  the  College  choirs. 

It  was  Simeon  who  in  1816  set  himself  to  purchasing  the 
livings  of  popular  watering-places  and  large  towns.  Although 
this  was  done  with  the  best  intentions,  it  has  acted  in  the  long 
run  in  casting  a  blight  on  such  places.  In  that  year  he  wrote 
to  Dean  Milner  :  "  Cheltenham,  where  there  are  ten  thousand 
souls,  besides  ten  thousand  visitors,  or  nearly  so,  is  mine.  It 
was  to  be  sold  for  £3,000,  and  I  instantly  secured  it.  .  .  .  Mary- 
le-bone,  where  there  are  one  hundred  thousand  souls,  is  also  to  be 
sold.  The  price  named  is  £40,000.  I  hope  to  get  it  much  under, 
and  if  it  be  sold  so  low  as  £25,000  it  is  mine  at  this  moment." 

Evangelicalism  in  the  English  Church  fed  Dissent,  which 
gave  more  highly  spiced  doctrine  than  the  sober  Low  Churchmen 
could  set  before  their  people.  Thirteen  young  men,  converted 
by  Venn,  became  dissenting  ministers. 

In  1830  the  Evangelical  party  could  boast  that  they  had 
alienated  from  the  Church  the  greater  portion  of  the  people, 
and  increased  the  number  of  meeting-houses  from  35  to  1,000. 
Venn  on  leaving  Hudders field,  in  lieu  of  exhorting  his  flock  to 
abide  in  the  Church,  sanctioned  and  subscribed  to  the  erection 
of  a  dissenting  chapel  j  "  and  when  another  Vicar  came,  from 
whom  he  never  wished  the  people  to  secede,  but  few  returned 
to  the  Church."  Butt,  Vicar  of  Kidderminster,  habitually,  in 
full  canonicals,  held  the  plate  at  the  door  of  the  Kidderminster 
meeting-houses.  Mr.  Wills,  knowing  that  the  Gospel  would  not 
be  preached  according  to  Calvin,  on  resigning  the  curacy  of 
S.  Agnes  sold  his  family  plate  to  build  a  dissenting  chapel.  Mr. 
Ingham,  a  priest,  placed  himself  at  the  head  of  eighty-four 
congregations  formed  on  the  Moravian  pattern,  of  which  all  but 
thirteen  left  him  and  became  Sandemanians.  From  Robinson's 
congregation  at  Leicester  a  hundred  at  a  time  would  pass 
to  the  meeting-house  from  church.    Newton,  at  Olney,  with 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT 


93 


a  population  of  2,500,  turned  his  people  into  Antinomians, 
Christians  without  morality. 

For  thirty-seven  years  the  Evangelical  clergy  went  from 
place  to  place,  preaching  indifferently  in  Dissenting  meeting- 
houses or  in  Church  pulpits,  till  the  decision  of  the  Consistorial 
Court  in  1777  pronounced  the  illegality  of  such  procedure, 
and  this  induced  some,  but  by  no  means  all,  to  desist  from 
invading  the  chapels.  A  certain  number  severed  their  congrega- 
tions from  the  Church.  Indeed,  Berridge  frankly  admitted  : 
"  God  sends  Gospel  ministers  into  the  Church,  to  call  people 
out  of  it.  What  has  happened  to  Venn's  Yorkshire  flock  will 
happen  to  the  Yelling  flock,  and  mine,,,  also  to  Dr.  Conyers'  flock 
at  Helmsley. 

"  This  was  a  fatal  drawback  in  the  Evangelical  movement, 
that,  except  so  far  as  it  helped  to  revive  religion  in  England," 
says  Mr.  Hore,  "it  did  nothing  to  strengthen  or  reform  the 
Church ;  that,  contrariwise,  it  gave  an  enormous  impetus  to 
Dissent,  virtually  creating  it  in  Wales,  and  developing  it  every- 
where else,  so  that  under  its  reign  and  through  its  influence 
more  congregations  seceded  from  the  Church  of  England  than 
individuals  seceded  to  Rome  under  the  Oxford  movement  " 
(ii.  244).  It  is  a  matter  of  fact  repeatedly  noticed,  that  nowhere 
does  Dissent  flourish  and  maintain  its  vigour  more  fully  than 
where  the  parish  churches  are  in  the  hands  of  Simeonite  or  other 
Puritan  Trustees. 

But  after  the  passing  away  of  the  early  Fathers  of  Evan- 
gelicalism what  a  falling  off  was  there  !  When  we  come  to  their 
successors,  Evangelicalism  had  become  fashionable — it  was  not 
the  religion  of  the  Gentiles,  but  of  the  Genteels.  And  they 
became  alarmed  at  the  uprising  of  the  Tractarians.  These  latter 
had  the  Prayer  Book  and  its  Rubrics  to  appeal  to,  and  could 
refer  back  to  the  Caroline  Divines  as  approved  exponents  of 
Church  doctrine  and  practice.  Their  very  position  was  menaced 
by  the  plain  words  and  rubrical  directions  of  the  Book  which 
they  were  pledged  to  use  in  their  public  ministrations,  but  which 
they  had  disregarded.  Accordingly  a  number  of  Evangelical 
clergy  united  with  Lord  Robert  Grosvenor  (afterwards  Lord 
Ebury)  in  1854  to  form  a  Prayer  Book  Revision  Society,  and 
some  of  their  objects  were  :  (a)  The  substitution  of  the  word 
minister  for  priest  whenever  the  officiating  clergyman  is  in- 
tended ;  (b)  The  omission  of  the  Ornaments  Rubric ;  (c)  The  re- 
moval of  certain  phrases  in  the  Communion  Service  that  favoured 


94 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


priestly  confession  and  absolution ;  (d)  The  removal  from  the 
Baptismal  service  of  such  expressions  as  favoured  the  doctrine  of 
Baptismal  Regeneration ;  (e)  The  alteration  of  the  words  in 
the  Ordinal  "  Receive  thou  the  Holy  Ghost,"  etc.,  and  the  clause 
"  Whose  sins  thou  dost  forgive,"  etc.,  and  the  corresponding 
Absolution  in  the  Visitation  of  the  Sick. 

What  these  clergy  did  not  see  was,  that  by  such  demands 
they  were  admitting  that  the  Tractarian  party  was  honest  in 
its  observance  of  the  ruling  of  the  Prayer  Book,  and  that  they 
were  not.  Their  action  was  self -condemnatory.  They  wanted 
to  have  the  Church  accommodated  to  their  level.  To  continue  to 
use  a  book  that  taught  doctrines  which  they  repudiated,  deprived 
their  position  of  all  moral  weight.  Had  they  been  honest  men 
and  possessed  the  discipline  and  sincerity  of  their  Scottish 
co-religionists  of  the  Disruption,  they  would  have  quitted  the 
Church  of  England  en  masse,  and  started  a  sect  of  their  own,  as 
did  Bishop  Cummins  with  perfect  honesty  in  the  United  States. 
They  did  not  do  so,  and  remain  to  the  present  day  an  alien 
element  in  the  Church,  but  not,  as  I  hope  to  show  shortly, 
without  their  use. 

Although  there  existed  a  sad  degeneracy  among  the  ranks  of 
the  so-called  Evangelicals,  trading  on  the  fame  of  the  leaders 
of  the  movement,  Venn,  Simeon,  Milner,  Scott,  etc.,  employing 
their  language,  but  devoid  of  their  enthusiasm,  there  remained 
some  admirable  men.  Of  these,  of  supreme  excellence,  to  carry 
on  the  best  tradition,  was  Lord  Ashley,  afterward  Earl  of  Shaftes- 
bury ;  than  whom  none  has  obtained  a  higher  name  as  a  social 
reformer  and  redresser  of  the  wrongs  of  the  oppressed.  Although 
an  "  Evangelical  of  the  Evangelicals,"  and  with  his  mind  cramped 
by  their  prejudices  and  hedged  about  with  their  limitations,  he 
constantly  expressed  his  dissent  from  the  ordinary  Evangelicals 
of  the  day.  "  The  Ritualists,"  he  said,  "  have  more  zeal  for 
Christ  than  the  Evangelicals.  There  are  noble  exceptions,  but, 
as  a  body, '  this  people  honour  Me  with  their  lips,  but  their 
heart  is  far  from  Me,' "  and  his  complaint  at  the  coldness,  bitter- 
ness, insincerity,  of  the  bulk  of  the  Evangelicals  was,  as  the 
writer  of  his  Life  assures  us,  "  not  a  sentiment  written  down  in 
the  heat  of  the  moment — it  is  repeated  again  and  again  in  his 
Diaries."  "  Who,"  he  once  contemptuously  added,  in  speaking 
of  the  men  of  his  day  who  professed  to  be  Low  Churchmen,  "  is 
to  lead  a  regiment  like  that  ?  Even  Falstaff  could  not  march 
through  Coventry  with  them." 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT  95 


That  he  was  persistently  hostile  to  the  Catholic  revival  is 
true  enough,  but  this  was  due  to  his  ignorance  of  its  principles. 
If  his  promotions  to  bishoprics  and  deaneries  were  of  men  of 
no  mental  calibre,  no  learning,  and  not  of  conspicuous  piety, 
there  was  no  help  for  it.  He  was  compelled  to  present  to  Lord 
Palmerston  for  promotion  such  "  men  "  as  Mouldy,  Shadow, 
Wart,  Feeble  and  Bullcalf.    He  could  find  no  others. 

John  Louis  Mallet,  son  of  Mallet  du  Pan,  who  married  my 
great-aunt  Lucy  Baring,  kept  a  diary  which  he  wrote  up  to  1827, 
and  which  is  still  in  manuscript.  It  affords  us  some  interesting 
particulars  relative  to  the  Evangelicals  of  his  day.  He  writes 
of  the  Baring  family  : 

"As  a  part  of  the  intellectual  history  of  the  age  in  which  I 
have  lived,  I  may  perhaps  without  impropriety  say  something 
of  the  religious  turn  of  the  family. 

14  The  person  with  whom  it  originated  was  Mrs.  Wall  (Harriet), 
eldest  daughter  of  Sir  Francis  Baring,  who  married  early  in 
life  a  partner  of  the  house,  Mr.  Wall,  a  shrewd,  bustling, 
practical  man  of  business.  Mrs.  Wall  kept  her  father's  house, 
and  did  the  honours  of  it  for  some  time  in  Devonshire  Square, 
and  afterwards  in  Berkeley  Square,  until  his  death.  Sir  Francis 
was  a  man  of  the  world,  and  connected  with  parliamentary 
people,  who  lived  in  very  high  circles.  Mrs.  Wall  was  then  a 
warm  Whig  in  politics  and  a  frequenter  of  the  theatres,  an  en- 
thusiastic admirer  of  Mrs.  Siddons.  Other  views  of  life,  however, 
grew  upon  her,  previously  to  her  father's  and  her  husband's 
deaths,  and  she  had  the  good  sense,  as  she  has  since  with  her 
son,  not  to  let  the  concerns  of  another  life  materially  interfere 
with  the  habits  and  feelings  of  those  to  whom  she  was  bound  by 
domestic  ties.  After  her  husband's  death  she  sold  Aldbury,  a 
beautiful  place  in  Surrey,  which  he  had  left  her,  and  took  a  house 
at  Lymington,  in  Hampshire,  within  easy  distance  of  her  son's 
estate  at  Norman  Court,  and  of  her  brother,  Sir  Thomas,  at 
Stratton.  She  then  set  about  converting  to  Calvinistic  views 
such  members  of  her  family  as  were  under  the  reach  of  her 
influence — Sir  Thomas  and  Lady  Baring,  Mr.  George  Baring, 
and  her  two  younger  sisters,  Mrs.  Kemp  and  Mrs.  Story,  and 
through  them  leading  their  husbands,  who  in  a  fit  of  religious 
zeal  abandoned  their  property  and  became  Evangelical  clergy- 
men. But  as  it  is  in  the  nature  of  things  that  when  we  pursue 
an  object  with  great  eagerness  and  zeal,  we  should  not  rest 
satisfied  with  the  attainment  of  it,  so  it  is  with  religion  as  a 


96 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


passion,  as  Mrs.  Wall  pursued  it.  Novelties  of  doctrine  con- 
tinued to  have  unabated  attractions ;  and  Mr.  Evans,  a  clergy- 
man of  Lymington,  a  man  of  education  and  talent,  having 
peculiar  views,  I  believe,  on  the  subject  of  baptism,  which  differed 
from  those  of  the  Established  Church,  they  started  a  little  sect 
of  their  own.  Mr.  Evans  removed  to  London,  where  he  built 
a  chapel,  with  the  assistance  of  Mrs.  Wall,  and  a  separatist 
congregation  was  formed,  to  which  it  then  became  Mrs.  Wall's 
great  object  to  bring  proselytes.  The  headquarters  were  estab- 
lished at  Stratton,  a  beautiful  house  replete  with  every  con- 
venience and  luxury,  and  where  vital  Christianity  could  be 
combined  with  the  refinements  of  creature  comforts  and  attend- 
ance. 

"  Mr.  Snow,  a  son  of  a  banker  of  that  name  [Snow  had  been 
an  actor  under  the  name  of  Hargreave.  He  seceded  from  the 
Church  in  1815  and  returned  to  it  in  1826 — John  Bull,  July  23, 
1826],  and  Mr.  Be  van,  both  young  men,  were  then  the  ministers 
of  the  adjoining  parishes  of  Stratton  and  Micheldever,  and 
Mr.  Drummond  of  the  Grange  and  his  brother,  neighbours  of 
Sir  Thomas,  had  fallen  in  with  the  new  opinions.  At  Stratton, 
therefore,  divers  young  proselytes  congregated ;  other  '  seekers 
after  the  Lord  '  were  also  occasionally  found  there.  Stratton 
became  a  convocation  to  settle  debatable  points.  Mrs.  Wall 
was  there  in  all  her  glory,  for  her  natural  capacity,  dexterous 
intelligence,  and  cool  temperament  gave  her  a  real  superiority 
over  the  heated  brains  and  crude  notions  of  her  disciples  ;  among 
others  she  soon  numbered  her  brother,  George  Baring,  and  her 
two  brothers-in-law,  Mr.  Kemp  and  Mr.  Story.  Such  of  these 
as  had  livings  gave  them  up.  This  was  the  case  with  George 
Baring,  who  held  a  living  of  his  brother  Alexander  in  Wiltshire. 
After  a  youth  marked  by  every  species  of  extravagance,  and 
his  making  a  rapid  fortune  in  one  of  those  golden  prebends  of 
the  E.  I.  Co.  at  Canton  which  are  reserved  for  sons  of  directors, 
he  had  late  taken  orders,  and  he  now  became  a  Dissenting  Min- 
ister and  built  a  chapel  at  Exeter,  which  his  name  and  religious 
zeal  and  the  novelty  of  his  doctrine  very  soon  filled.  Mr.  Kemp, 
who  is  Lord  of  the  Manor  of  a  great  part  of  Brighton,  built  a 
chapel  there,  where  he  officiated  as  preacher.  Mr.  Snow  opened 
a  chapel  at  Cheltenham,  but  at  the  end  of  a  couple  of  years, 
and  after  having  got  together  large  congregations  and  drawn 
many  people  away  from  their  accustomed  faith,  by  persuading 
them  that  this  was  the  only  road  to  salvation,  Mr.  Baring,  Mr. 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT 


97 


Kemp,  and  Mr.  Snow  threw  up  the  concern,  and  resumed  their 
blue  coats,  leaving  their  flocks  to  seek  out  new  guides. 

"  Mr.  Snow  returned  to  the  Church.  Mrs.  Mallet  and  I  were 
at  Stratton  in  October  1822,  when  he  arrived  there  with  his 
family  to  meet  Mr.  Simeon  of  Cambridge,  a  sort  of  Evangelical 
bishop,  who  came  to  meet  the  stray  sheep  on  his  return  to  the 
fold,  and  to  christen  two  children,  who  had  been  born  during 
the  time  of  their  father's  apostasy.  Mr.  Evans  remained  a 
dissenter.  Sir  Thomas  Baring  himself  adheres  to  the  Church. 
George  Baring  ruined  himself  by  speculations  in  grain,  Mr. 
Kemp  nearly  so  by  building  speculations  at  Brighton,  and  Mr. 
Story  by  losses  at  play ;  so  it  is  difficult  on  the  whole  to  conceive 
anything  more  discreditable  than  this  religious  sally. 

"  What  Mrs.  Wall's  opinions  have  been  since,  I  know  not. 
I  believe  that  she  became  a  follower  of  Irving,  but  her  address 
and  position  still  secured  her  considerable  influence  in  religious 
circles,  whatever  they  were,  and  I  heard  now  and  then  of  her 
taking  under  her  spiritual  guidance  some  stray  Duchess  who 
had  deserted  the  ranks  of  fashionable  life  to  place  herself  under 
Mrs.  Wall. 

M  In  the  course  of  September  1810  [error  for  1809]  I  went  by 
myself  for  a  short  time  to  Stratton,  Sir  Thomas  Baring  having 
asked  me,  as  a  sort  of  favour,  to  come  and  meet  Lord  and  Lady 
Lansdowne,  who  were  expected  there  for  a  few  days.  I  had 
met  Lord  and  Lady  Lansdowne  at  the  Romillys'  and  Marcets', 
and  remember  attending  some  lectures  on  the  steam-engine 
given  by  Marcet  at  his  own  house  to  a  select  party  of  friends,  at 
which  Lord  Lansdowne  was  severely  burnt  by  the  bursting  of  a 
boiler  by  means  of  which  a  beautiful  steam-engine  was  worked. 
I  forget  most  of  the  other  people  at  Stratton  on  this  occasion, 
but  two  of  them  I  can  very  well  remember — Jekyl,  Master  in 
Chancery  at  the  time  and  a  friend  of  Fox,  whose  bon  mots  and 
talent  for  anecdote  amused  the  town  for  so  many  years ;  and  a 
very  different,  though  likewise  a  clever  man,  the  Rev.  Mr. 
Cunningham,  Vicar  of  Harrow,  who  lately  had  taken  a  lead  in 
the  new  Church  party  denominated  Evangelical,  and  who  was  a 
great  person  in  that  line,  and  among  other  places  at  Stratton, 
where  these  opinions  had  already  been  taking  deep  root.  Mr. 
Cunningham  was  a  forward,  self-sufficient,  though  a  good- 
natured  man,  with  unbounded  confidence  in  himself,  and  that 
sort  of  manner  which  in  one  of  a  less  sacred  cloth  might  be  termed 
impudent. 
7 


98 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


"  At  that  time  he  came  to  Stratton  whenever  it  suited  him, 
with  his  wife,  several  children,  three  servants,  and  three  horses, 
which  were  all  quartered  in  the  house,  sometimes  for  two  or  three 
months  together ;  and  I  remember  some  jokes  among  the  young 
people  on  the  subject  of  a  lame  mare  which  he  left  to  graze 
at  Stratton  Park  for  many  months  after  the  family  had  left  the 
place,  and  went  by  the  name  of  Madam  Cunningham.  None 
but  the  men  who  keep  the  keys  of  Paradise  take  such  liberties  as 
these.  Mr.  Cunningham  being  one  of  those  favoured  beings,  and 
having  withal  the  advantage  of  a  good  person  and  address,  had 
engaged  the  affections  and  married  a  Miss  Williams,  one  of  the 
daughters  of  a  Mr.  Williams  of  Moor  Park,  with  whom  he  had  a 
portion  of  £20,000 — a  very  good  beginning  for  a  young  divine  ; 
and  when  he  lost  his  lady  and  was  married  again  to  a  daughter 
of  General  Sir  Harry  Calvert,  I  understand  that  he  might  have 
thrown  the  handkerchief  to  almost  any  woman  of  rank  and 
fortune  in  the  Calvinistic  circles  of  the  Church.  Such  success 
implies  great  knowledge  of  the  world,  as  well  as  those  other 
qualities  and  acquirements,  upon  which  it  was  apparently 
founded,  and  Mr.  Cunningham  is  not  deficient  in  these  respects. 
He  had  been  at  school  with  Denman  ;  but  as  Denman  had 
turned  out  something  of  an  ultra- Whig  or  a  Democrat,  no  remi- 
niscences of  their  early  acquaintance  had  come  across  his  mind, 
until  Denman's  appointment  to  the  situation  of  Common  Ser- 
geant of  the  City  of  London,  when  he  unexpectedly  received  a 
letter  from  his  old  schoolfellow,  addressing  him  as  '  Dear  Den- 
man,' with  congratulations  and  a  printed  copy  of  his  sermons. 

"  But  to  return  to  my  Stratton  visit.  It  so  happened  that 
Sir  Francis  Baring,  with  all  his  desire  to  do  honour  to  Lord  Lans- 
downe  and  to  make  his  house  agreeable  to  him,  could  not  have 
committed  a  greater  mistake  than  the  having  asked  Mr.  Cunning- 
ham to  meet  him,  for  Lord  Lansdowne  well  remembered  when 
he  stood  for  Cambridge  in  1806,  as  Lord  Henry  Petty,  that  he 
applied  to  Cunningham  for  his  vote,  and  it  was  attempted  on 
Cunningham's  part  to  make  it  a  matter  of  bargain  and  sale  : 
Cunningham  stipulating  that  if  he  voted  for  Lord  Henry,  Sir 
Francis  Baring,  whose  connexion  with  the  Lansdowne  family  and 
the  Whigs  he  well  knew,  and  who  was  a  director  of  the  E.I.  Co., 
should  get  some  appointment  in  India  for  a  brother  of  his.  These 
things  are  understood  to  the  north  of  the  Tweed,  but  they  are 
not  so  common  in  the  south,  and  the  proposition  was  accordingly 
scouted.    Mr.  C.  was  perfectly  aware  of  this  little  blot,  and  in- 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT 


99 


stead  of  absenting  himself  for  a  few  days  on  the  plea  of  some 
spiritual  call,  he  determined  de  faire  bonne  mine  d  mauvais  jeut 
and  the  first  day  he  made  up  to  Lady  Lansdowne,  talking  to  her 
across  the  table  in  a  manner  so  unusual  and  familiar,  that  both 
Lord  and  Lady  Lansdowne  were  very  much  annoyed  and  dis- 
gusted, and  treated  him  with  marked  reserve.  Mr.  C.  felt  the 
rebuke,  and  looked  perfectly  miserable. 

"  The  next  day  a  party  was  formed  to  go  to  see  Avington,  one 
of  the  Duke  of  Buckingham's  seats  near  Winchester.  Most  of 
the  gentlemen  went  on  horseback.  I  preferred  a  seat  in  one  of 
the  carriages,  and  Lord  Lansdowne  contrived  to  make  the  ride 
so  unpleasant  to  Cunningham  that  he  came  to  me  at  Avington, 
and  requested,  as  a  most  particular  favour,  that  I  would  allow  him 
to  take  my  place  in  the  carriage.  I  am  a  very  bad  rider,  and 
riding  is  not  agreeable  to  me ;  but  he  looked  so  piteous  that  I 
yielded  to  his  wishes.  I  never  saw  a  man  more  thoroughly 
humbled  ;  but  Lord  and  Lady  Lansdowne  left  Stratton  next 
day,  and  both  his  spirits  and  his  spiritual  pride  recovered  their 
wonted  elasticity." 

The  Rev.  Mr.  Cunningham  was  typical  of  a  good  many  others 
of  the  same  sort.  Another  notable  instance  was  Toplady,  the 
author  of  the  beautiful  hymn  "  Rock  of  ages,  cleft  for  me," 
about  the  only  thing  he  ever  wrote  that  was  not  worthless.  In 
his  diary  he  records  that  his  sermons  gave  great  satisfaction  to 
himself.  "  I  preached  for  forty  minutes  with  great  ease  to 
myself,  and  with  great  strength,  readiness  and  distinctness.  It 
was  a  blessed  season  to  my  own  heart."  But  although  he  drew 
large  congregations  in  the  church  of  Broad  Hembury,  of  which 
he  was  incumbent,  he  was  not  satisfied.  He  wrote  :  "I  can 
truly  say  that  my  lot  has  never  hitherto  been  cast  among  a 
people  so  generally  ignorant  of  Divine  things,  and  so  totally 
dead  to  God.  I  know  of  but  three  persons  in  all  this  large  and 
populous  parish  in  whom  I  have  solid  reason  to  trust  a  work 
of  saving  grace  is  begun,  and  these  are  Mrs.  Hutchins,  James 
William  Taylor,  and  Joan  Venn."  He  craved  for  a  more 
emotional  and  impressionable  congregation,  and  on  the  plea 
that  the  humid  air  of  Devonshire  did  not  suit  him,1  deserted 
his  flock  in  1775,  and  went  to  London  to  the  fogs,  where  he 
could  find  persons  more  congenial  to  his  ministry  than  the  poor, 

1  Hembury  lies  high,  486  ft.  above  the  sea,  sheltered  on  the  north-east 
and  west  by  encircling  hills  rising  to  850-895  ft.  The  air  is  bracing,  but 
not  cold. 


100 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


ignorant,  simple  souls  of  the  Devonshire  village.  He  did  not, 
however,  resign  his  two  livings,  but  went  on  drawing  the  emolu- 
ments, and  supplied  his  place  with  a  succession  of  underpaid 
curates.  In  London  he  could  find  sheep  to  pasture  with  more 
wool  on  their  backs.  He  was  taken  up  by  Lady  Huntingdon, 
and  could  command  her  purse.  Early  in  1775  he  hired  the 
meeting-house  of  the  French  Calvinists  in  Orange  Street, 
Leicester  Square,  for  Sunday  and  Wednesday  evenings,  and 
began  preaching  there  on  April  11.  For  the  three  years  he  was 
in  London  till  his  death  in  1778,  he  never  once  went  near  Broad 
Hembury  or  Sheldon,  his  two  livings  in  Devonshire.  It  may 
well  be  asked  how  he  justified  to  himself  continuing  to  draw  his 
stipend  from  both,  with  setting  up  a  conventicle  in  London. 
The  fact  was  that  these  men  conceived  they  had  a  call  to  preach 
the  Gospel  to  large,  wealthy  and  fashionable  congregations,  and 
that  duty  must  be  disregarded  in  presence  of  such  a  call. 

There  was  great  liability  to  self-deception,  when,  as  Hood 
says  : 

Every  farthing  candle-ray 
Conceives  itself  a  great  gas-jet  of  light. 

Tom  Hood  was  denounced  by  Rae  Wilson  as  godless,  because 
he  wrote  humorous  poems,  absolutely  innocent,  not  tainted 
with  any  grossness.  Hood  answered  him  in  his  inimitable 
Ode  to  Rae  Wilson  : 

I'm  not  a  Saint 
Not  one  of  those  self-constituted  saints, 
Quacks — not  physicians — in  the  cure  of  souls, 
Censors  who  sniff  out  mortal  taints, 
And  call  the  devil  over  his  own  coals — 
These  pseudo  Privy  Councillors  of  God, 
Who  write  down  judgements  with  a  pen  hard-nibb'd, 

Ushers  of  Beelzebub's  Black  Rod  ; 
Commending  sinners,  not  to  ice  thick-ribbed, 
But  endless  flames,  to  scorch  them  up  like  flax — 
Yet  sure  of  Heav'n  themselves,  as  if  they'd  cribb'd 
The  impression  of  S.  Peter's  Keys  in  wax. 

With  sweet  kind  natures,  as  in  honey'd  cells, 

Religion  lives,  and  feels  itself  at  home. 

But  only  on  a  formal  visit  dwells 

Where  wasps  instead  of  bees  have  formed  the  comb. 

Shun  pride,  O  Rae  ! — whatever  sort  beside 

You  take  in  lieu,  shun  spiritual  pride  ! 

A  pride  there  is  of  rank,  a  pride  of  birth, 

A  pride  of  learning  and  a  pride  of  purse ; 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT  101 


A  London  pride — in  short,  there  be  on  earth 
A  host  of  prides,  some  better  and  some  worse, 
But  of  all  prides,  since  Lucifer's  attaint, 
The  proudest  swells  a  self-elected  saint  ! 

Charles  Dickens  came  across  this  type  of  Evangelical,  and 
sketched  the  male  specimen  in  Mr.  Chadband  and  the  female 
in  Mrs.  Jellyby. 

But  apart  from  conscious  or  unconscious  humbugs,  there 
was  much  real  piety  in,  and  much  good  done  by  the  Evangelicals. 
Where  they  failed,  it  was  due  to  limitation,  or  to  a  false  element 
in  their  teaching,  which  fostered  self-righteousness. 

Among  some  excellent  types  I  can  recall,  was  the  Rev.  H.  A. 
Simcoe  of  Penheale,  near  Launceston.  He  was  squire  as  well 
as  parson,  and  lived  in  a  beautiful  old  mansion  with  Elizabethan 
ceilings  and  panellings,  that  had  come  into  the  Simcoe  family  by 
purchase.  He  always  wore  Hessian  boots  with  a  tassel  in  front, 
and  stood  up  over  six  feet,  was  of  strong  build  and  powerful 
muscles.  Belonging  to  the  Evangelical  school,  having  been  one 
of  Charles  Simeon's  disciples,  he  spent  his  energies  and  his  money 
on  all  the  organizations  called  into  being  by  his  party.  He  went 
about  wherever  invited  to  preach  in  pulpits  and  harangue  on 
platforms.  At  home  he  had  made  his  picturesque  old  manor- 
house  into  a  store  of  everything  necessary  to  daily  life.  The 
lads  and  girls  of  the  parish  of  Egloskerry  were  taught  trades 
under  his  eye — tailoring,  bootmaking,  basket- weaving  and  the 
manufacture  of  a  thousand  other  commodities  likely  to  be  wanted 
in  a  region  where  there  are  no  shops.  He  established  a  printing 
press  in  the  house,  from  which  issued  tracts  and  a  periodical, 
The  Light  of  the  West,  printed  on  poor  paper,  with  on  the  cover  a 
representation  of  the  Eddystone  lighthouse.  We  had  piles  of 
these  in  the  house,  but  they  were  all  burnt.  I  regret  it  now, 
as  these  papers  would  have  contained  many  significant  anecdotes 
of  conversions,  happy  deaths,  and  special  providences,  that 
would  prove  instructive  reading  at  the  present  day.  "  The 
manor-house  of  Penheale  still  stands,"  says  a  modern  writer. 
"  Its  industrial  accessories  may  have  disappeared,  but  in  all 
parts  of  the  world  may  be  found  British  settlers  who,  or  whose 
parents,  leaving  England  in  the  nineteenth  century's  most 
distressful  years,  owe  much  of  their  success  in  a  new  world  to 
habits  acquired  and  handiwork  learned  at  Penheale — in  its  day 
the  uniquely  beneficent  training  school  for  emigrants."  1 
1  Escott,  Society  in  the  Country  House  (1907),  p.  263. 


102 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


With  all  its  faults,  we  owe  an  incalculable  debt  of  gratitude 
to  the  Evangelical  revival.  It  produced  a  marvellous  change  in 
English  social  life  j  it  made  speech  more  decent,  and  banished  pro- 
fane oaths.  It  caused  the  Sunday  to  be  observed  as  the  Lord's 
Day,  though  on  the  false  assumption  that  it  was  the  Sabbath. 
Family  prayers,  and  grace  before  and  after  meals,  became  general, 
and  personal  piety  was  quickened.  The  majority  of  the  early 
Evangelical  school  were  sincerely  earnest,  and  lived  holy  and 
self-denying  lives.    Newman  in  his  Apologia  testifies  to  this. 

It  was  their  fiery  zeal  and  absolute  sincerity  that  made  the 
early  Evangelicals  a  dominant  power  in  the  English  Church. 
"  Regarded  purely  as  a  spiritual  force,  the  Evangelicals  were 
undoubtedly  the  strongest  party  in  the  Church  during  the  first 
thirty  years  of  the  nineteenth  century.  So  much  was  this  the 
case  that  spiritual  earnestness  was  in  itself  a  presumption  that  a 
man  was  an  Evangelical,  and  some  were  placed  in  that  category 
simply  because  they  were  spiritually- minded,  though  in  point 
of  fact  they  were  out  of  sympathy  with  many  of  the  tenets  of 
Evangelicalism. " 1  And  Mr.  Lecky  goes  so  far  as  to  say  that 
the  "  Evangelicals  gradually  changed  the  whole  spirit  of  the 
English  Church.  They  infused  into  it  a  new  fire  and  passion  of 
devotion,  raised  the  standard  of  clerical  duty,  and  completely 
altered  the  whole  tone  and  tendency  of  the  preaching  of  its 
ministers." 2  That  there  were  windbags  and  hypocrites  (not 
consciously  so)  among  those  who  were  Evangelical  preachers 
is  no  condemnation  of  the  movement.  These  were  the  camp- 
followers,  not  the  leaders. 

A  friend  sends  me  this  :  "  In  1853,  when  Easter  holidays  came, 
I  went  to  spend  them  with  a  certain  Low-Church  incumbent  in 
one  of  the  midland  manufacturing  towns.  I  found  my  sister 
staying  there  as  well ;  she  was  utterly  miserable,  and  I  speedily 
discovered  the  reason.  The  clergyman  was  a  rank  Calvinist,  and 
his  wife  had  been  brought  up  as  a  Scottish  Presbyterian.  The 
house  was  regulated  throughout  on  the  severest  Puritan  system. 
If  my  sister  or  I  were  merry  and  laughed,  then,  in  the  evening, 
in  the  extemporary  prayer  put  up  before  the  servants  and 
visitors,  we  were  prayed  for  to  be  delivered  from  the  ungodly 
spirit  of  levity.  I  had  brought  a  Shakespeare  with  me.  This 
was  discovered,  and  I  was  required  to  keep  it  locked  up  in  my 

1  Overton,  The  English  Church  in  the  Nineteenth  Century  (London, 
1894).  P-  9". 

?  History  of  England  in  the  Eighteenth  Century,  ii.  chap.  ix. 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT  103 


portmanteau,  lest  it  should  be  seen  by  the  domestics.  I  asked 
for  a  book  to  read,  and  was  offered  The  Dairyman's  Daughter, 
and  Elliott  on  the  Apocalypse  ;  which  latter  I  thought  sank  to 
an  abysmal  depth  of  silliness  such  as  I  had  before  thought 
inconceivable.  I  have  visited  Crosse  and  Blackwell's  factory 
when  they  were  making  pickles,  and  I  found  the  whole  atmosphere 
impregnated  with  vinegar  and  the  smell  of  gherkins.  It  ap- 
peared to  me  that  I  was  in  a  religious  pickle  manufactory,  where 
the  air  was  charged  with  sour  fumes  enough  to  set  one's  teeth 
on  edge.  When  I  left,  and  the  cabman  let  me  out  of  his  con- 
veyance at  the  station,  '  Well,'  said  he,  '  how  did  you  get 
on  there  ?  '  I  shrugged  my  shoulders.  1  Ah,'  said  he,  1  just 
before  you  arrived  I  took  away  two  young  ladies  who  had  been 
there  on  a  visit,  and  they  were  like  mad  things,  escaped  from 
confinement.  They  romped  in  the  cab — and  smashed  a  pane 
of  glass  in  the  window.' " 

A  general  conviction  prevailed,  and  was  not  unfounded,  that 
the  sons  of  these  ultra-Evangelicals  when  getting  out  into  life 
went  wholly  to  the  bad,  or  else  dashed  across  the  frontiers  into 
Rome.  Girls  often  became  tricky,  sly  and  untrustworthy.  I 
have  myself  known  such  cases. 

Going  out  of  curiosity  to  an  Evangelical  meeting,  I  heard  a 
man  discourse  on  a  platform  against  the  iniquities  of  the  theatre. 
He  told  an  effective  story,  how  that  a  young  man  piously  brought 
up  at  home  under  Gospel  teaching,  on  being  launched  into 
London  freedom,  resolved  on  going  to  the  theatre.  As  he  was 
in  the  queue,  he  looked  up  and  saw  the  direction  "  This  way  to 
the  Pit."  He  recoiled — "  the  Pit  !  "  He  returned  to  his  lodgings, 
a  converted  Christian. 

There  were  two  great  centres  of  Evangelicalism  near  London, 
Islington  and  Clapham.  I  never  came  in  contact  with  the  Low 
Churchmen  of  the  former  place,  but  I  had  relatives  at  Clapham 
who  belonged  to  the  strictest  form  of  Low-Churchism,  wealthy 
people,  who  lived  uncommonly  well,  kept  a  well- furnished  table 
and  an  excellent  cellar.  I  was  a  boy  then,  and  was  somewhat 
amused  to  see  how  every  degree  of  indulgence  was  tolerated  in 
meats  and  drinks,  but  music,  literature,  the  theatre,  and  games, 
were  tabooed.  They  had  strawberries  out  of  season,  when  they 
cost  something  like  sixpence  apiece,  but  we  young  folk  were 
not  suffered  to  play  Puss  in  the  Corner.  From  the  library,  Sir 
Walter  Scott's  novels  were  excluded,  as  also  those  of  Jane  Austen. 

Sydney  Smith  wrote  of  the  Clapham  sect :  "  Danger  to  the 


104 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Church  arises,  not  from  the  Catholics  but  from  the  Methodists, 
and  from  that  patent  Christianity  which  has  been  for  some  time 
manufacturing  at  Clapham  to  the  prejudice  of  the  old  and  ad- 
mirable article  prepared  by  the  Church.  I  would  counsel  my 
Lords  the  Bishops  to  keep  their  eyes  upon  that  holy  village  and 
its  hallowed  vicinity.  They  will  find  a  zeal  there  for  making 
converts  far  superior  to  anything  which  exists  among  the 
Catholics  ;  a  contempt  for  the  great  mass  of  English  clergy 
much  more  rooted  and  profound,  and  a  regular  fund  to  purchase 
livings  for  these  groaning  and  garrulous  gentlemen,  whom  they 
denominate  (by  a  standing  sarcasm  against  the  regular  Church) 
Gospel  preachers  and  vital  clergymen." 

The  fund  to  which  Sydney  Smith  alludes  is  the  "  Simeonite 
Trust  "  for  livings,  especially  in  watering-places  and  towns  of 
social  importance  ;  these  were  bought  so  as  to  secure  a  succes- 
sion of  incumbents  with  Calvinistic  views.  The  Trustees  do  not 
seem  to  have  felt  much  interest  in  village  cures.  It  was  the 
fashionable,  the  noble  and  the  wealthy  they  strove  to  catch  in 
their  net — not  the  little  fish. 

Thackeray  had  been  brought  up  surrounded  by  a  cordon  of 
the  straitest  sect  of  Evangelicalism,  and  he  revolted  against 
it,  for  he  speedily  discerned  its  intellectual  feebleness,  its  self- 
complacency,  its  incapacity  for  laying  hold  of  the  great  problems 
of  life  and  thought.  And  he  has  transferred  to  his  pages  portraits 
of  the  men  and  women  he  had  known — the  Dowager  Lady 
Southdown,  authoress  of  The  Washerwoman  of  Finchley  Common  ; 
Sophia  Alethea  Newcome,  the  Bishopess  of  Clapham,  surrounded 
by  a  bevy  of  Evangelical  toadies,  men  like  the  Revs.  Bartholomew 
Irons,  Silas  Hornblower  and  Luke  Waters. 

I  was  walking  one  day  with  a  friend  in  a  small  town  in  the 
West  of  England  that  was  in  the  hands  of  the  Simeonite  Trustees. 
The  vicar  was  extreme  in  his  Calvinism,  and  had  recently  in  a 
sermon  declared  that  he  knew  of  only  three  persons  in  the  place 
who  were  saved,  he  himself  of  course  being  one.  Now  I  have 
always  held  that  the  sin  of  idolatry  does  not  involve  only  the 
worship  of  idols,  but  the  setting  up  of  new  religions  apart  from 
the  Church.  As  we  walked  down  the  High  Street,  I  was  struck 
with  the  number  of  dissenting  meeting-houses  of  all  descriptions. 
Turning  to  my  companion,  I  said  :  "It  appears  to  me  that 
this  town  is  wholly  given  over  to  idolatry."  "  Yes,"  he  replied  ; 
and  pointing  to  the  parish  church,  said,  "  And  there  is  the  altar 
to  the  Unknown  God." 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT  105 


It  must  be  recognized  that  present-day  Evangelicalism  is 
not  by  any  means  so  severe,  sour  and  heretical,  not  to  say  anti- 
nomian,  as  some  of  it  was  fifty  to  seventy  years  ago.  The  vinegar 
is  actually  losing  its  acidity  and  is  turning  sweet.  It  is  deserving 
of  note  that  the  modern  Evangelical  no  longer  preaches  the 
Calvinistic  doctrine  of  the  ministers  of  forty  or  fifty  years  ago. 
No  congregation  would  now  endure  the  inhumanity  of  such 
teaching.  Nor  does  he  now  hold  fast,  as  did  his  predecessors, 
to  Verbal  Inspiration.  The  better  type  of  Evangelical  contents 
himself  with  striving  to  deepen  personal  religion,  and  for  this 
he  is  well  calculated.  But  the  other  wing  of  the  party  is  more 
or  less  lost  in  Broad-Churchism. 

Even  among  the  Scottish  Presbyterians  the  most  repulsive 
tenets  of  Calvin  are  ignored.  The  basis  of  union  of  the  Free 
Kirk  and  the  United  Presbyterian  Establishment,  and  the  fifth 
clause  of  the  Scottish  Church  Act  of  1905,  remove  from  both 
established  and  non-established  communities  any  obligation  to 
hold  to  Calvinism  in  the  old  literal  sense. 

Mr.  J.  Ewing  Ritchie  says  :  "  The  Calvinism  of  the  moderns 
is  not  the  Calvinism  of  the  Westminster  Assembly,  and  yet  every 
(Presbyterian)  clergyman  at  his  ordination  declares  that  he 
sincerely  owns  and  believes  the  whole  doctrine  contained  in  the 
Confession  of  Faith  to  be  founded  upon  the  Word  of  God  j 
acknowledges  it  as  the  Confession  of  his  Faith  ;  and  that  he 
will  firmly  and  constantly  adhere  to  it  ;  and  that  he  disowns 
all  doctrines,  tenets  and  opinions  whatsoever  contrary  to,  and 
inconsistent  with,  the  Confession."1 

We  are,  it  must  never  be  forgotten,  indebted  to  the  Evangelical 
movement  for  some  great  benefits,  that  last  and  will  last. 

(1)  Sunday  Schools. — The  Evangelicals  deserve  the  credit 
of  having  founded  these.  There  exist  but  scanty  traces  of  them 
before  1781,  when  Mr.  Raikes,  a  bookseller  of  Gloucester,  and  Mr. 
Stock,  a  clergyman,  started  the  movement.  They  were  looked 
on  askance  at  first  by  Bishop  Porteus  of  London,  but  later  met 
with  his  full  approval.  Rowland  Hill  is  thought  to  have  been 
the  first  to  inaugurate  them  in  London,  and  he  took  occasion 
in  a  sermon  to  defend  them  against  the  objection  raised  by 
Horsley,  Bishop  of  Rochester,  who  considered  that  they  might 
be  used  for  political  purposes. 

Hannah  More  and  her  sisters  devoted  themselves  to  the  duty 
of  illumining  the  ignorance  in  sacred  things,  and  softening  the 
1  Ritchie  (J.  E.),  The  Religious  Life  of  London  (1870),  p.  144. 


106 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


manners  of  the  young,  in  the  part  of  Somersetshire  where 
they  had  settled,  by  opening  Sunday  Schools.  The  institution 
rapidly  spread.  The  instruction  was  almost  wholly  in  Bible 
reading,  but  where  the  clergy  were  orthodox,  the  Catechism  was 
also  taught.  Beyond  that  there  was  no  definite  Church  teaching. 
The  children  were,  however,  expected  to  learn  by  heart  the 
collect  for  the  day. 

(2)  Hymns. — A  strong  prejudice  was  felt  by  the  orthodox 
against  the  use  of  any  hymns  in  divine  service  except  the  few 
that  had  got  annexed  to  Tate  and  Brady's  Metrical  Psalms. 
Indeed,  Bishop  Marsh  of  Peterborough  in  his  charge  of  1823 
denounced  them  on  the  ground  that  it  was  a  preferring  of  the 
words  of  man  to  those  of  God.  But  they  were  largely  employed 
in  Dissenting  meeting-houses,  and  the  Evangelical  clergy  intro- 
duced them  into  their  churches.  The  Olney  Hymns — a  collection 
to  which  Newton  contributed  largely — became  popular.  But 
when  Heber,  afterwards  Bishop  of  Calcutta,  had  compiled  a 
hymnbook  for  use  in  his  church  at  Hodnet,  he  applied  in  vain 
in  1820  to  Manners-Sutton,  Archbishop  of  York,  and  to  Howley, 
Bishop  of  London,  to  obtain  authorization  to  use  it. 

Bishop  Marsh,  already  alluded  to,  spent  £4,000  in  a  lawsuit 
to  stop  the  use  of  an  unauthorized  hymnbook  in  a  church  of  the 
diocese  of  Peterborough. 

(3)  Fervour  in  preaching. — The  old  style  of  parson  addressed 
the  Intellect.  He  exhorted  to  a  virtuous  life ;  he  showed  that 
vice  led  to  ruin  even  in  this  world  ;  he  produced  arguments 
in  favour  of  a  revealed  religion  ;  he  propounded  reasons  why 
we  should  believe  in  the  existence  of  God. 

Sydney  Smith  wrote  :  "  The  great  object  of  modern  sermons 
is  to  hazard  nothing.  Their  characteristic  is  decent  debility, 
which  alike  guards  their  authors  from  ludicrous  errors  and  pre- 
cludes them  from  striking  beauties.  Every  man  of  sense  in 
taking  up  an  English  sermon  expects  to  find  it  a  tedious  essay, 
full  of  commonplace  morality."  1 

The  preaching  of  the  Evangelicals  was  the  reverse  of  this. 
They  appealed  directly  to  the  hearts  and  souls  of  their  hearers. 
Instead  of  the  impersonality  of  the  addresses  of  the  clergy  of 
the  old  school,  they  made  religion  a  matter  of  individual  applica- 
tion and  feeling.    Consequently  they  drew  crowds  to  hear  them. 

At  first  the  Low-Church  party  looked  askance  at  the  move- 
ment for  establishing  Colonial  and  Missionary  bishoprics,  since 
1  Sydney  Smith's  Works,  i.  10. 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT  107 

they  feared  lest  the  authority  of  the  Committees  of  the  "  Church 
Missionary  "  and  the  "  Colonial  and  Continental  "  Societies  over 
their  men  might  be  impaired.  The  missionary,  they  thought, 
would  naturally  look  up  to  and  respect  the  bishop  on  the  spot, 
rather  than  the  little  knot  of  authorities  at  home,  albeit  these 
latter  held  the  purse.  They  need  not  have  feared  it,  as  was  seen 
in  Ceylon,  where  the  Church  Missionary  clergy  were  actively 
disloyal  to  their  Bishop,1  also  in  Syria  towards  Bishop  Blyth ; 
and  in  India,  the  clergy  of  the  Church  Missionary  Society  refused 
to  recognize  the  same  Bishop  as  had  been  appointed  for  the 
missions  of  the  Society  for  the  Propagation  of  the  Gospel.  They 
might  have  reckoned  with  confidence  on  the  wilfulness  of  their 
employes.  Moreover,  these  Low-Church  Societies  could  dangle 
before  their  eyes  hopes  of  preferment,  such  as  the  bishops  set 
over  them  could  not  offer. 

The  Evangelicals  uniting  with  the  Dissenters  raised  strenuous 
opposition  to  the  sending  of  a  Bishop  to  Madagascar  in  1874; 
finally  the  difficulty  was  overcome  by  having  him  consecrated 
in  Scotland.  For  ten  years  this  disgraceful  opposition  had  been 
carried  on  successfully.  The  anger  of  the  obstructionists  was 
great  when  their  efforts  were  defeated. 

The  party  leaders  soon  saw  what  a  mistake  they  had  made, 
and  they  used  their  powerful  influence  to  procure  the  appoint- 
ment of  men  of  their  own  views,  men  not  infrequently  without 
breeding  and  tact,  very  frequently  their  most  obsequious  servants, 
to  the  vacant  sees.  By  so  doing  they  accomplished  two  results : 
first  of  all  they  were  able  to  stain  with  their  own  opinions  the 
infant  Churches  in  the  colonies  ;  and  then  secondly,  when  these 
nominees  resigned  their  sees,  as  they  almost  invariably  did, 
after  a  very  few  years'  service,  and  returned  home,  they  were, 
by  virtue  of  their  episcopal  character,  popped  into  positions  of 
great  influence  and  no  little  dignity.  Hence  the  Church  at  home 
had  a  large  infusion  of  low-toned  Christianity  poured  into  her 
by  these  "  returned  Empties." 

A  few  years  ago  there  were  no  less  than  thirty  bishops  who, 
like  the  hireling  of  the  Gospel,  had  deserted  their  flocks,  and 
were  in  England  snuggling  into  the  cosy  corners  provided  for 

1  The  clergy  were  summoned  in  1865  by  Bishop  Claughton  to  meet 
him  in  synod.  Those  maintained  by  the  C.M.S.  did  not  feel  themselves 
at  liberty  to  obey  the  Bishop's  summons  without  the  consent  of  their 
"  superiors  "  in  Salisbury  Square  ;  and  the  permission,  when  asked,  was 
refused.  Under  Bishop  Claughton's  successor  the  same  contumacy  was 
encouraged. 


108 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


them  by  their  Evangelical  friends  at  home.  No  less  than  three 
of  these  were  ex-bishops  of  Sierra  Leone,  and  at  one  time  three 
ex-bishops  of  Colombo. 

The  plea  for  resignation  was  health ;  but  it  was  remarkable 
how  their  healths  and  appetites  recovered  in  England,  and 
they  were  able  to  take,  and  take  with  avidity,  canonries,  pre- 
bendal  stalls,  archdeaconries,  along  with  plump  livings,  even 
bishoprics,  in  England. 

As  to  those  sees  that  have  been  under  Evangelical  formation 
and  organization ,  they  compare  with  such  as  have  been  founded 
and  governed  by  men  of  Church  principles  as  a  rickety  child 
does  with  one  who  is  robust. 

I  remember  many  years  ago  I  knew  at  Cambridge  a  man  who 
was  wheeled  about  in  a  bath-chair.  Through  want  of  lime  in  his 
blood  all  his  bones  had  become  as  gelatine,  and  he  was  reduced 
to  a  feeble,  helpless  lump  of  humanity.  A  clever  doctor  said  : 
"  Why,  it  is  lime  you  want.  Lime  you  must  have,"  and  he 
dosed  him  with  lime-water.  Under  this  treatment  the  patient 
became  strong,  firm  in  bone  ;  he  grew  from  a  doubled-up  heap 
of  flesh  into  an  upright  man.  And  the  Colonial  and  Missionary 
Churches  in  the  hands  of  the  Evangelicals  were  like  this  unhappy 
wretch.  What  they  needed  was  the  lime-water  of  the  Catholic 
Faith.  When  that  is  given  them  they  recover,  where  it  is  still 
denied  they  retain  their  gelatinous  structure  and  their  incapacity. 

The  decline  of  Evangelicalism  is  due  to  several  causes.  One  is 
that  it  never  encouraged  objective  worship,  and  exaggerated  a 
subjectivity  of  religion  that  needs  to  be  supplemented  with 
objectivity.  Moreover,  as  already  said,  early  Evangelicalism 
had  no  realization  of  the  Church  as  an  organized  body,  and 
that  the  body  of  Christ. 

Then  again,  a  doubt  was  entertained  as  to  their  sincerity. 
Mr.  Ritchie  says  :  "A  fact  becomes  increasingly  prominent ; 
the  readiness  of  the  Evangelicals  to  swallow  their  words,  to 
quietly  accept  whatever  may  be  offered  them  by  their  opponents 
merely  for  the  sake  of  position  in  society.  Every  now  and  then 
a  crisis  occurs  in  the  history  of  the  Church.  If  Baptismal  Re- 
generation, for  instance,  be  ruled  to  be  permissible,  they  must 
leave ;  and  then,  when  the  time  comes  for  them  to  arise  and 
become  martyrs,  they  quickly  pocket  their  principles  and  remain. 
Of  course  they  plead  their  greater  opportunities  of  usefulness,  as 
if  religion  were  better  served  by  dishonesty  than  by  honesty — 
as  if  the  cause  of  God  were  better  advanced  by  falsehood  than  by 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT  109 


truth — as  if  position  as  regards  society  were  of  more  importance 
than  the  man's  consciousness  of  independence  and  honourable 
life.  For  the  Ritualist  or  the  Broad  Churchman  it  is  no  difficult 
matter  to  remain  in  the  Church  in  communion  with  the  Evan- 
gelical ;  but  they,  in  accordance  with  his  theory,  are  teaching 
soul-destroying  errors  ;  yet  he  remains  with  them  and  is,  ac- 
cording to  his  idea,  a  partaker  in  their  sins."1 

Dissenting  ministers  look  on  them  as  dishonest  men.  They 
know  that  these  Evangelicals  differ  from  them  in  no  point  of 
belief,  or  rather  of  disbelief  ;  they  know  that  they  omit  the 
use  of  what  in  the  Prayer  Book  they  dislike,  or  put  upon  it  a 
non-natural  gloss — and  they  ask  why  these  men  remain  where 
they  are,  and  find  the  reason  in  the  clinging  to  their  benefices  for 
the  sake  of  social  position  and  income.  No  amount  of  fawning 
on  the  Dissenter,  inviting  him  to  put  on  a  surplice  and  read  the 
lessons  in  Church,  or  invading  the  meeting-house  to  occupy  the 
pulpit  j  no  slobbering  over  the  dear  Nonconformist  brother 
at  Grindelwald  and  Keswick  conferences,  and  meetings  of  the 
Evangelical  Alliance,  can  remove  the  impression. 

The  hunting  after  association  with  Dissenting  ministers  is 
due  largely  to  a  craving  after  popularity,  and  as  it  is  the  fashion 
of  the  day  to  be  "  liberal-minded,"  these  men  proclaim  their 
readiness  to  dance  as  popular  opinion  pipes  to  them.  They 
forget  the  words  of  Our  Lord,  "  Woe  unto  you  when  men  shall 
speak  well  of  you,  for  so  did  their  fathers  to  the  false  prophets." 
The  Evangelical  of  the  present  day  no  more  resembles  the  Evan- 
gelical of  the  class  of  Simeon,  Toplady  and  Whitefield  than  does 
a  Nonconformist  of  to-day  resemble  the  sturdy  Puritan  of  the 
Commonwealth.  The  fact  from  which  he  has  not  been  able  to 
escape,  to  which  he  cannot  shut  his  eyes,  is  that  the  doctrine 
of  Verbal  Inspiration  can  no  longer  be  held  by  him  with  sure 
hands  as  the  unshaken  basis  on  which  his  system  can  be  upreared. 
Biblical  criticism,  though  it  has  often  gone  very  much  too  far, 
and  is  always  on  the  change,  has  yet  brought  to  light  truths  that 
cannot  be  blinked,  and  established  facts  that  may  not  be  over- 
looked. He  fears  to  maintain  the  verbal  exactitude  of  such 
incidents  as  Balaam's  ass  speaking  with  man's  voice,  as  the  sun 
and  moon  actually  standing  still  in  the  battle  of  Bethhoron,  of 
Jonah  spending  three  days  and  nights  in  the  belly  of  the  whale  j 
and  he  is  hesitating  and  timorous  as  to  the  foundation  of  his 
religion.  That  on  which  his  fathers  planted  their  feet  so  securely 
1  Ritchie,  The  Religious  Life  of  London  (1870),  p.  78. 


110 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


has  been  knocked  away  from  under  him.  He  fought  against 
the  principle  of  Biblical  criticism  with  the  courage  of  despair, 
and  now  has  succumbed.  Criticism  has  by  this  time  found  the 
results  of  its  work  popularized  and  accepted  in  quarterlies, 
magazines,  popular  fiction,  and  daily  papers.  To  a  large  and 
increasing  extent  he  who  began  as  an  Evangelical  finds  himself 
on  a  sloping  plank  down  which  he  slips  and  becomes  a  Broad 
Churchman.  But  there  are  others,  and  these  the  majority, 
in  whom  religious  and  Evangelical  instinct  is  strong,  and  who, 
though  hardly  yet  having  found  a  footing,  fall  to  exhortations  to 
piety,  to  encouragement  of  devotion,  and  to  living  a  holy  life  ; 
such  are  constrained  to  a  wider  tolerance,  to  take  a  broader 
outlook  more  consonant  with  natural  science  and  textual  criti- 
cism, but  as  yet  they  have  not  formulated  a  system.  Some 
there  be  who  cling  tenaciously  to  the  old  doctrine  of  verbal 
inspiration — but  these  are  to  be  found  mostly  lodging  about 
in  nooks  and  corners  like  hibernating  snails. 

Meanwhile  the  old  Puritan  hostility  to  the  High-Church  party 
is  disappearing.  Some  of  the  venerable  controversies  are  dead 
and  becoming  as  obsolete  as  Guelph  and  Ghibelline  ;  and  each 
party  is  beginning  to  realize  that  the  other  holds  and  lays  stress 
on  a  truth,  but  not  the  whole  truth.  The  Evangelical  principle 
is  individualism,  the  union  of  the  soul  with  God,  and  a  con- 
sciousness of  that  union — indeed,  a  conviction  that  it  has  taken 
place.  The  High  Churchman  insists  on  the  corporate  life  of  the 
Church,  and  insists  on  the  Sacraments  as  the  means  of  Grace. 
An  infusion  into  his  teaching  of  the  Evangelical  doctrine  would 
rescue  from  the  danger  of  formalism.  The  Evangelical,  on  the 
other  hand,  is  even  now  coming  to  appreciate  that  which  his 
predecessors  did  not — the  value  of  the  Church  as  a  bond  of  union 
and  a  pillar  of  the  Faith. 

There  is  a  curious  passage  in  The  Banquet  of  Plato,  in  which 
Aristophanes  expounds  his  theory  of  Love.  Man  when  created 
was  hermaphrodite,  containing  in  himself  all  the  qualities  and 
characteristics  of  the  two  sexes;  but  Zeus  "  cut  human  beings 
in  half,  as  people  cut  eggs  before  they  salt  them,"  and  thus 
produced  the  two  distinct  sexes  ;  and  there  is  an  inclination 
and  a  gravitation  of  one  to  the  other,  because  till  united  each 
is  imperfect.  At  first,  possibly,  there  is  repulsion,  because  the 
thoughts,  feelings  and  impulses  of  the  one  sex  differ  radically 
from  those  of  the  other.  But  eventually  each  discovers  his 
own  shortcomings,  and  then  they  are  drawn  together. 


THE  EVANGELICAL  MOVEMENT  111 


Now  this  seems  to  me  to  represent  the  two  parties  in  the 
Church,  the  Evangelical  and  the  Orthodox.  Each  without  the 
other  is  incomplete.  At  first  they  kept  very  separate,  and 
distrusted  each  other.  But  that  condition  has  now  passed, 
and  they  are  disposed  to  coquet  and  flutter  about  each  other 
like  Papagino  and  Papagina  in  the  Zauberflote — seeking  close 
and  lasting  union.  "  I  cannot  restrain  the  poetic  enthusiasm 
which  takes  possession  of  my  discourse,"  says  Agathon  in  the 
same  dialogue,  "  and  which  bids  me  declare  that  Love  is  the 
divinity  Who  creates  peace  among  men,  and  calm  upon  the  sea, 
the  windless  silence  of  storms,  repose  and  sleep  in  sadness. 
Love  divests  us  of  all  alienation  from  each  other,  and  fills  our 
vacant  hearts  with  overflowing  sympathy  j  he  gathers  us  together 
in  such  social  meetings  as  we  now  delight  in  celebrating." 

Those  opposed  eyes, 
Which  like  the  meteors  of  a  troubled  heaven, 
All  of  one  nature,  of  one  substance  bred, 
Did  lately  meet  in  the  intestine  shock, 

Shall  now,  in  mutual  well-beseeming  ranks 
March  all  one  way,  and  be  no  more  opposed. 

/  Henry  IV,  Act  I,  sc.  ii. 

I  quote  the  Index  to  a  Book  of  Devotion  by  a  Dissenter, 
Sir  H.  E.  Lunn.  The  book  is  entitled  The  Love  of  Jesus,  and 
was  published  in  191 1. 

Motives  of  Prayer.    General  Prayer.    The  Lord's  Prayer. 

Devotions  for  days  of  .  .  .  retirement. 

Method  of  Prayer  for  the  Christian  Year. 

Readings  for  the  Hours  of  the  Passion. 

Meditations  on  the  Lord's  Supper. 

Hymns  on  the  Lord's  Supper. 

Preparations  for  the  Holy  Communion. 

Prayers  before  the  Holy  Communion. 

Order  of  Administration  of  the  Holy  Communion. 

Prayers  after  the  Holy  Communion. 

Method  of  Bible  reading. 

Methods  of  Fasting. 

The  Preface  is  dated  Lent.  The  Order  of  Administration  is  that 
of  the  Prayer  Book,  with  the  substitution  of  minister  for  Priest 
and  with  the  omission  of  the  rubrics  for  the  manual  acts  at  the 
Consecration. 

If  there  be  such  a  levelling  up  among  those  who  are  not 
Churchmen,  what  may  we  not  expect  among  those  who  are  ? 


CHAPTER  V 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES 

TO  understand  the  condition  into  which  the  English 
Church  had  fallen  at  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth 
century  it  is  well  to  have  in  one's  hand  certain  statistics. 
I  will  take  first  of  all  those  made  by  the  Bishops,  produced 
in  the  House  of  Lords  in  1807.  By  the  returns  of  that  date 
the  number  of  incumbents  resident  in  the  11,164  parishes  of 
England  and  Wales  was  only  4,412,  or  little  more  than  one  in 
every  third  parish.  There  were  actually  resident,  including 
such  as  lived  near  but  not  in  their  parishes,  not  exceeding  5,000, 
that  is  to  say  about  one  to  every  two  parishes. 

Of  the  resident  incumbents  in  1810  there  were  about  1,500 
whose  incomes  were  under  £150  per  annum.  In  that  year  the 
number  of  livings  under  £150  a  year  were  : 


Not  exceeding  £10  a  year  . 

12 

From  £10  to  £20  inclusive  . 

•  72 

From  £20  to  £30 

.  191 

From  £30  to  £40 

•  353 

From  £40  to  £50 

•  433 

From  £50  to  £60 

•  407 

From  £60  to  £yo 

.  376 

From  £70  to  £80 

•  319 

From  £80  to  £90 

.  309 

From  £go  to  £100 

•  315 

From  £100  to  £110  . 

.  283 

From  £110  to  £120  . 

•  307 

From  £120  to  £130  . 

.  246 

From  £130  to  £140 

.  205 

From  £140  to  £150  . 

.  170 

Total 

•  3,998 

Of  these  poorly  endowed  livings  2,500  of  the  whole  were  left 
to  the  pastoral  care  of  Curates,  who  in  many  cases  received  no 
more  than  £40  per  annum. 

112 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES  113 


In  1832  in  England  and  Wales  there  were  4,361  livings  under 
£150 ;  there  were  2,626  without  parsonages,  2,183  with  such  as 
were  unfit  to  serve  as  residences.  In  1831,  in  the  diocese  of 
Exeter,  as  many  as  280  incumbents  were  non-resident,  mainly 
because  they  had  in  their  parishes  no  houses  in  which  they  could 
reside. 

In  1835,  out  of  7,167  parishes  in  England  and  Wales,  where 
the  living  exceeded  £150,  there  were  3,556  incumbents  either 
actually  or  virtually  resident,  leaving  2,612  cases  in  which  only 
curates  did  the  duties.  The  whole  number  of  non-resident 
incumbents  of  all  classes,  after  deducting  sinecures,  was  found 
to  be  5,925.  Of  these,  those  clergy  who  were  non-resident  in 
one  parish  because  pluralists,  but  did  reside  in  another,  were 
1,797.  Deducting  these,  and  a  few  others  for  whom  reasonable 
explanation  was  forthcoming,  from  the  whole  number  there  still 
remained  3,500  parishes  which  were  either  not  served  at  all  by 
a  curate  or  were  served  by  the  curate  of  a  neighbouring  parish. 

In  1836  the  whole  income  of  the  Church,  notwithstanding 
the  spoliation  to  which  she  had  been  subjected,  amounted  to 
£3,490,497,  but  of  this  £435,046  was  absorbed  by  the  Bishops  and 
other  dignitaries  ;  and  it  was  very  unequally  distributed  among 
the  Bishops,  for  whereas  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  put 
into  his  pocket  annually  £18,090,  the  Bishop  of  London  £13,890, 
and  of  Durham  £19,480  ;  the  Bishop  of  Oxford  had  but  £1,600, 
of  Rochester  £1,400  ;  and  the  see  of  Gloucester,  not  then  united 
with  Bristol,  was  worth  only  £700  a  year. 

In  like  manner  the  livings  of  the  parochial  clergy  were  of 
unequal  value :  whereas  some  small  country  benefices  were  worth 
£3,000,  £4,000,  or  even  £7,000  per  annum,  large  parishes  in 
London,  Lancashire  and  Yorkshire,  containing  20,000  or  30,000 
inhabitants  apiece,  were  not  above  £150. 

In  the  diocese  of  Exeter,  in  1839,  the  condition  was  this  : 
Out  of  628  parishes,  244  were  without  resident  incumbents  ;  of 
these,  however,  162  had  resident  curates.  Fifteen  parishes  were 
served  by  incumbents  living  two  miles  off,  and  22  by  curates  of 
neighbouring  parishes.  There  were  at  that  date  10  parishes  in 
which  parsonage  houses  were  in  process  of  construction,  but 
there  were  12  uninhabited  by  incumbent  or  curate.  As  to  non- 
residence,  this  must  be  taken  into  account — that  there  was  one 
parish  with  only  15  people  in  it,  another  with  29,  several  under 
80,  and  forty  with  not  more  than  100. 

It  will  be  seen  from  the  above  statistics  that,  although  non- 

8 


114 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


residence  and  pluralism  are  most  undesirable,  it  was  not  possible 
to  avoid  both,  when  livings  were  so  poor  that  a  rector  or  vicar 
could  not  live  on  his  incumbency  alone.  A  provision  that 
sufficed  for  an  unmarried  priest  was  not  sufficient  for  a  parson 
with  wife  and  family.  Moreover,  before  the  Reformation  the 
incumbent  very  frequently  lived  in  the  manor-house,  where  he 
acted  as  domestic  chaplain  and  tutor  to  the  children.  This 
condition  of  affairs  ceased  ;  and  in  many  parishes  there  were 
no  parsonage  houses  extant,  and  there  was  no  money  available 
wherewith  to  build  one.1 

The  scandal  of  pluralism  was  not  confined  to  England  or  to 
the  Hanoverian  period.  Thomas  Cantilupe,  Bishop  of  Hereford, 
who  died  in  1282,  was  simultaneously  precentor  and  Canon  of 
York,  Archdeacon  of  Stafford,  Canon  of  Lichfield,  Canon  of 
London,  Canon  of  Hereford,  and  held  the  livings  of  Doderholt, 
Hampton,  Aston,  Wintringham,  Deighton,  Rippel,  Sunterfield, 
and  apparently  also  that  of  Prestbury.  Thomas  a  Becket  was 
given  S.  Mary-le-Strand  and  Otford,  with  prebends  in  both 
S.  Paul's  and  Lincoln,  before  he  was  even  in  deacon's  orders. 

In  Germany  pluralism  was  rampant,2  in  France  before  the 
Revolution  it  was  common.  But  in  England  pluralism  existed 
mainly  because  the  livings  were  so  poor ;  while  in  Italy,  France 
and  Germany  it  flourished  because  they  and  the  bishoprics  and 
abbacies  were  so  rich. 

In  1801,  William  Dickenson,  member  for  Ilchester,  brought 
in  a  bill  before  the  House  "  to  protect  and  relieve  .  .  .  spiritual 
persons  from  vexatious  prosecutions  by  common  informers, 
under  statute  of  King  Henry  VIII,  in  consequence  of  their  non- 
residence  on  their  benefices  or  their  taking  of  farms." 

In  the  case  of  information  lodged,  the  case  proved  and  the 

1  What  gave  great  occasion  to  pluralism  was  the  Black  Death  in  1348 
and  again  in  1361.  It  swept  away  nearly  one-third  of  the  inhabitants. 
Above  50,000  persons  were  said  to  have  perished  in  London  alone.  The 
mortality  among  the  clergy  was  great,  and  at  its  disappearance  there 
were  only  enough  left  for  one  priest  to  minister  in  three,  four  and  even 
more  parishes. 

2  Popes  even  then  were  pluralists.  Clement  II  retained  the  wealthy 
bishopric  of  Bamberg,  and  Leo  IX  that  of  Toul.  Verily  instead  of  the 
Papacy  resting  on  Simon  Peter,  it  reposed  on  Simon  Magus.  The  popes 
provided  for  their  "  nephews  "  and  other  favourites  in  the  most  scandalous 
manner.  I  give  one  instance  out  of  many  :  Gulielmus  Brunelli  being  made 
Provost  of  Wells,  aged  twenty-three  years,  had  an  indult  in  1289,  not 
being  ordained  priest,  to  hold  as  well  the  Church  of  Westerham,  also 
canonries  and  prebends  of  Lichfield,  Salisbury,  Llandaff,  S.  David's  and 
S.  Omer  ;  later  he  resigned  Westerham,  so  as  to  get  another  benefice 
and  a  prebendal  stall  at  Exeter. 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES  115 


fine  imposed,  half  went  to  the  Crown  and  half  to  the  common 
informer. 

Now  let  us  see  what  were  the  provisions  of  that  Act  which 
could  be  invoked  and  put  in  force  against  an  incumbent,  should 
he  attempt  to  improve  his  income,  by  any  captious  and  aggrieved 
parishioner  who  resented  having  his  tithe  exacted  with  strictness. 

Under  this  statute  no  clergyman ,  beneficed  or  not  beneficed, 
could  rent  a  house,  except  in  a  city,  market-town  or  borough, 
under  the  penalty  of  £10  per  month  ;  no  vicar  could  lease  a 
parsonage,  under  a  penalty  amounting  to  ten  times  the  value  of 
the  profits  of  such  lease.  No  clergyman  was  permitted  to  hold 
a  lease  of  land  under  any  circumstances  whatever,  even  though 
it  had  descended  to  him  by  inheritance,  and  although  he  himself 
did  not  occupy  the  land,  under  a  penalty  of  ten  times  its  annual 
value  ;  no  clergyman  was  suffered  so  much  as  to  buy  or  sell  a 
cow  without  becoming  liable  to  forfeit  triple  its  value. 

Undoubtedly  the  Act  became  generally  inoperative,  but  it 
hung  like  a  threatening  cloud  over  the  heads  of  the  clergy  ; 
it  could  at  any  time  be  enforced,  and  that  it  was  enforced 
occasionally  is  seen  from  the  preamble  of  William  Dickenson's 
Bill.  Incumbents  who  did  reside  were  always  at  the  mercy  of 
litigious  and  dissatisfied  parishioners. 

At  the  same  time  that  curates  were  starving  on  their  £30  or 
£40  a  year,  the  Bishops,  Deans  and  Canons  were  gorged  with 
wealth,  and  doing  nothing  for  it.  The  Black  Book  (1820-23) 
gives  a  statement  of  the  mode  in  which  the  revenues  of  the 
Church,  amounting  to  £9,459,565,  were  distributed. 


Class. 

Average  Income 
of  each. 

Total. 

Episcopal  Clergy  : 

2  Archbishops  . 

£26,465 

£52,930 

24  Bishops  ...... 

10,174 

£244,185 

Dignitaries  : 

28  Deans  ...... 

1,580 

44.250 

61  Archdeacons     .        .        .        .  . 

739 

45,126 

26  Chancellors      .        .        .        .  . 

494 

12,844 

514  Prebendaries  and  Canons,  330  Pre- 

centors,    Succentors,  Vicars-General, 

Minor  Canons,  Priests- Vicars,  etc. 

338 

111,650 

Parochial  Clergy  : 

2,886  Aristocratic  Pluralists,  mostly  non- 

resident, and  holding  several  livings, 

in  all  7,037  livings,  averaging  each  ^764 

1,863 

5,379,430 

4,305  Incumbents,  holding  one  living  each, 

and  about  one-half   resident  on  their 

benefices  ...... 

764 

3,289,020 

Total  . 

£9,459,565 

116 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


The  curates,  licensed  and  unlicensed,  whose  average  stipend  of 
about  £75  per  annum,  amounting  together  to  £319,050,  are 
included  in  the  incomes  of  pluralist s  and  other  incumbents. 

Archbishop  Potter,  a  draper's  son,  noted  for  his  haughtiness, 
died  immensely  rich  with  the  spoils  of  the  Church,  and  dis- 
inherited his  eldest  son  for  marrying  against  his  wishes.  How- 
ever he  obtained  for  him  Church  benefices  to  the  value  of  £2,000 
a  year.  He  left  the  whole  of  his  fortune,  valued  at  £90,000,  to 
his  second  son,  who  was  a  reprobate. 

Bishop  Sherlock  died  worth  £150,000.  Of  him  it  was  said 
or  sung  : 

As  Sherlock  at  Temple  was  taking  a  boat, 

The  Waterman  asked  him  which  way  he  would  float ; 

"  Which  way  ?  "  said  the  Doctor :  "  Why,  fool,  with  the  stream." 

To  Paul's  or  to  Lambeth  was  all  one  to  him. 

A  son  of  Archbishop  Moore  died  in  1865.  He  was  Rector  of 
Hunton,  also  of  Eynesford,  also  of  Latchinford,  Canon  of  Canter- 
bury, and  Registrar  of  the  Will  Office  in  the  Prerogative  Court 
of  Canterbury.  The  gross  total  of  his  receipts  from  the  Church 
was  £753,647,  and  his  annual  income  close  on  £12,000. 

Majendie,of  Huguenot  ancestry,  Bishop  of  Bangor,  who  died 
in  1830,  held  no  fewer  than  eleven  parochial  preferments. 
Chandler,  Bishop  of  Durham,  Wills,  Bishop  of  Winchester,  and 
Gilbert,  Archbishop  of  York,  all  died  shamefully  rich,  some  of 
them  worth  more  than  £100,000.  In  a  series  of  letters  published 
in  the  Morning  Chronicle  between  November  6,  1813,  and 
March  11,  1814,  a  Mr.  Wright  favoured  the  public  with  many 
curious  disclosures  which  had  come  to  his  knowledge  as  secretary 
to  three  right  reverend  prelates — the  Bishops  of  London ,  Norwich 
and  Ely.  In  a  letter  of  November  20,  he  says  that  he  had 
selected  from  well-authenticated  documents  10,801  benefices, 
on  which  were  only  4,490  incumbents  said  to  be  resident,  so 
that  there  were  6,311  confessedly  non-resident  incumbents,  to 
supply  whose  places  1,523  resident  curates  were  employed, 
which  left  4,788  without  resident  curate  or  incumbent.  In 
one  diocese,  he  said,  one-third  of  the  parish  churches  had  the 
services  performed  in  them  reduced  from  twice  to  once  on  the 
Sunday.  A  very  general  excuse  made  for  non-residents  was 
bad  health.  "  Now,  ill-health  of  the  incumbent  himself,  or 
his  wife  or  daughter,  is  a  common  pretext,  when  no  other 
legal  cause  can  be  found  of  avoiding  residence.    Of  twenty-two 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES  117 


licences  granted  in  one  diocese  for  this  reason,  three  only  of  the 
persons  are  in  a  state  of  health  to  warrant  it,  and  the  benefices 
from  which  they  absent  themselves  are  very  valuable.  Some 
(of  these  incumbents)  live  in  town  during  the  winter  •  and 
although  night  air  certainly  cannot  benefit  a  valetudinarian, 
they  may  be  constantly  seen  at  card-parties,  routs,  or  the 
theatres  ;  in  summer  enjoying  the  amusements  of  fashionable 
watering-places,  whilst  too  often  their  curates,  by  the  par- 
simonious stipends  they  afford  them,  are  with  a  numerous  family 
in  a  state  of  the  greatest  poverty."  To  this  condition  of  affairs 
the  Latitudinarian  Bishops  appointed  by  the  Crown  had  brought 
the  clergy.  And  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  every  bishop 
set  to  work  not  only  to  feather  his  own  nest,  but  also  those  of 
his  sons  and  sons-in-law,  brothers,  nephews  and  other  relations. 
Bishop  Pretyman,of  Lincoln  and  afterwards  of  Winchester,  who 
changed  his  name  to  To  inline  on  acceding  to  a  large  estate,  did 
not  leave  his  children  destitute.  G.  T.  Pretyman  was  made 
Chancellor  and  Canon  of  Lincoln,  Prebendary  of  Winchester, 
Rector  of  Chalfont  S.  Giles,  Rector  of  Wheathampstead,  and 
Rector  of  Harpenden.  Another  son,  Richard,  was  also  made 
Canon  of  Lincoln,  Rector  of  Middleton-Stoney,  Rector  of  Wal- 
grave,  Rector  of  Wroughton,  and  Vicar  of  Hannington.  A 
third  son,  John,  was  created  Prebendary  of  Lincoln,  Rector  of 
Sherrington,  and  Rector  of  Win  wick. 

Sparke,  Bishop  of  Ely,  quite  as  scandalously  provided  for 
his  sons,  nephews  and  relatives.  A  list  may  be  found  in  the 
Black  Book.  Archbishop  Sutton  provided  seven  of  his  family 
with  sixteen  rectories,  vicarages,  and  dignities  in  cathedrals. 
Of  his  eleven  daughters,  several  had  the  prudence  to  marry  men 
in  holy  orders,  and  soon  became  amply  endowed.  Hugh  Percy 
married  one  daughter,  and  in  eight  years  was  given  as  many 
different  preferments,  bringing  in  together  about  £10,000  per 
annum.  He  was  afterwards  advanced  to  be  Bishop  of  Rochester, 
and  was  then  translated  to  Carlisle.  According  to  law  he  ought 
to  have  resigned  all  the  preferments  he  held  at  the  time  of  being 
promoted  to  a  bishopric — four  of  which,  by  the  way,  had  been 
given  him  in  one  year  ;  but  he  contrived  to  retain  the  most 
valuable  prebend  of  S.  Paul's,  worth  £3,000  per  annum,  and 
also  the  Chancellorship  of  Sarum.  Another  daughter  of  the 
Archbishop  married  James  Croft,  Archdeacon  of  Canterbury, 
incumbent  of  Hythe,  Rector  of  Cliffe  and  Rector  of  Salt  wood 
— all  preferments  in  the  gift  of  the  Archbishop.     A  sister 


118 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


married  Richard  Lockwood,  who  was  presented  in  one  year  by 
his  brother-in-law  with  the  three  vicarages  of  Kessingland, 
Lowestoft  and  Potter- Heigham  ;  all  these  livings  were  valuable, 
and  in  the  gift  of  the  Bishop  of  Norwich,  and  were  presented  by 
his  Grace  when  he  held  that  see. 

These  are  but  a  few  samples  of  the  nepotism  that  prevailed, 
and  of  the  low  tone  of  ecclesiastical  consciences.  What  could 
be  expected  of  the  clergy  under  such  a  system  ?  No  wonder  that 
the  Church  sank  in  the  esteem  of  the  people  and  was  regarded 
as  the  home  of  jobbery. 

Another  scandal  was  the  sale  of  livings.  There  were  in  London 
agents  who  sold  them  by  auction.  An  American  Bishop,  Dr. 
Hobart,  during  his  sojourn  in  this  country,  felt  shocked  by 
reading  the  following  details  of  the  traffic  in  the  Morning 
Chronicle,  July  13,  1824 :  "  The  Church  livings  in  Essex,  sold 
on  the  1st  instant,  by  Mr.  Robins,  of  Regent  Street,  were  not 
absolute  advowsons ;  but  the  next  presentations  contingent 
on  the  lives  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  W.  T.  P.  L.  Wellesley,  aged  thirty- 
six  and  twenty-five  years  respectively,  were  as  under  : 


Place. 

Description. 

Estimated 
Annual  Value. 

Age  of 
Incumbent. 

Sold  for 

£ 

£ 

Wanstead 

Rectory 

653 

63 

2,440 

Woodford 

1,200 

58 

4,200 

Gt.  Paindon  . 

500 

63 

1,600 

Fifield  . 

525 

59 

1,520 

Rochefort 

700 

62 

2,000 

Filstead 

Vicarage 

400 

50 

900 

Roydon  . 

200 

46 

580 

"The  biddings  appeared  to  be  governed  by  the  age  and 
health  of  the  incumbents,  residence,  situation,  and  other  local 
circumstances." 

I  knew  of  the  following  case  : 

A  certain  living  was  advertised  for  sale.  The  incumbent, 
whom  we  will  call  Mr.  Baker,  owned  the  presentation.  He  put 
a  price  on  the  living  which  was  so  high  that  a  would-be  pur- 
chaser demurred.  One  day  the  latter  received  a  telegram  from 
Baker's  lawyer  urging  him  to  come  down  at  once.  He  did  so, 
and  was  told  that  the  Rector  was  very  ill,  and  had  been  prayed 
for  in  church,  and  was  not  expected  to  live.  The  lawyer 
accompanied  the  would-be  purchaser  to  the  parsonage,  where 
he  was  admitted,  and  entreated  to  make  as  little  noise  as  possible 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES  119 


on  ascending  the  stairs,  and  to  stay  but  a  short  time  in  the  room 
of  the  dying  man.  He  and  the  lawyer  ascended,  and  saw  the 
old  man  in  bed  so  prostrate  as  to  be  scarce  able  to  speak.  No 
demur  ensued  as  to  the  price,  and  the  contract  of  sale  was  rapidly 
drawn  and  signed,  and  a  deposit  paid.  Then  the  purchaser 
went  down  and  walked  about  the  grounds  and  glebe.  Two  hours 
must  elapse  before  the  train  would  reconduct  him  to  town. 
Presently  Mrs.  Baker  emerged  from  the  house  into  the  garden 
and  begged  him  to  come  in  and  have  some  dinner.  This  he 
declined,  as,  under  the  circumstances,  he  did  not  wish  to  give 
trouble  in  the  house.  "  Not  at  all,"  answered  Mrs.  Baker :  "  Mr. 
Baker  would  be  glad  of  your  society."  "  Mr.  Baker  !  "  "I 
forgot  to  add,"  said  the  lady,  "  the  crisis  is  happily  past  and 
Mr.  Baker  is  risen,  dressed  and  impatient  for  his  dinner." 

The  dying  rector  and  patron  lived  on  for  twenty  years,  and 
bought  back  the  presentation  and  advowson  for  his  son.  I 
heard  the  story  from  the  rural  dean.  I  was  told  that  the  old 
rogue  cleared  £2,000  by  the  transaction. 

The  law  of  the  land  was  plain  enough,  but  it  was  evaded  in 
the  most  barefaced  manner.  According  to  enactments  of  the 
law,  if  a  patron  were  to  present  any  person  to  a  benefice  for  a 
corrupt  consideration,  by  gift,  promise,  or  reward,  the  presenta- 
tion was  rendered  void,  and  for  that  turn  lapsed  to  the  Crown. 
If  a  person  procured  a  presentation  for  money  or  profit  and  was 
presented,  he  was  disabled  from  holding  the  living.  But  by 
ingenious  methods,  by  the  subtle  craftiness  of  lawyers,  means 
were  devised  for  the  circumvention  of  the  law.  But  of  what 
moral  quality  can  a  man  have  been  who  by  such  means  gained 
a  position  in  the  sheepfold  ? 

In  1818  a  grant  of  a  million  was  made  by  Government  for 
the  creation  of  additional  churches  ;  a  further  grant  of  half 
a  million  was  made  in  1824,  but  part  of  this  went  to  Scotland. 
A  grant  of  £10,000  a  year  was  also  made  for  eleven  years  to  the 
Governors  of  Queen  Anne's  Bounty,  for  the  better  endowment 
of  poor  livings  ;  and  that  Bounty  has  not  only  been  continuously 
engaged  in  raising  the  value  of  such  livings,  but  it  also  has  lent 
money  to  incumbents  to  enable  them  to  provide  parsonage 
houses  for  their  cures.  But  the  greatest  boon  of  all  to  the  Church 
was  the  Tithe  Commutation  Act  of  1836.  By  this  useful 
measure  an  end  was  put  to  the  incessantly  recurring  disputes 
and  heartburnings  that  arose  out  of  the  valuation  of  tithe, 
and  the  occasional  attempt  made  to  take  it  in  kind.  The 


120 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


parson  exacting  his  tithe  pig  was  a  subject  of  caricature  and  of 
satirical  ballad. 

In  1802,  the  patronage  of  about  2,500  churches  belonged  to 
the  bishops  and  deans  and  chapters,  and  nearly  1,100  to  the 
Crown.  That  of  2,000  pertained  to  lay  corporations,  including 
the  colleges  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge.  The  remaining  number, 
rather  over  6,500,  were  in  the  hands  of  county  families  and  lay 
individuals. 

Crown  livings  were  disposed  of  as  payment,  or  part  payment, 
for  political  services  rendered  either  by  the  presentee  himself 
or  by  a  relative.  Bishops  gave  livings  to  relatives  and  to  men 
who  were  of  the  same  way  of  thinking  in  politics  and  church 
matters  as  themselves.  Chapters  passed  on  the  presentation 
from  one  member  to  another  that  they  might  accommodate  their 
families,  and  it  was  much  the  same  with  the  lay  corporations. 
The  colleges  appointed  men  who  held  a  fellowship  or  tutorship, 
and  the  incumbent  who  lived  in  College  rode  out  on  the  Satur- 
day evening,  perhaps  even  on  the  Sunday  morning,  and  returned 
to  his  rooms  in  College  after  afternoon  service.  If  the  livings 
were  good  and  at  a  distance  they  were  taken  by  such  fellows 
as  desired  to  get  married,  and  these  were  sufficiently  advanced 
in  years,  and  so  accustomed  to  their  University  life  as  to  be 
quite  unable  to  understand  and  sympathize  with  their  rustic 
congregations. 

Family  livings  went  to  younger  sons.  If  one  would  not  suffice 
to  keep  a  son  in  comfort,  a  second  was  obtained  for  him.  It 
was  not  a  matter  of  vocation,  but  of  convenience.  We  can 
form  an  idea  of  what  the  clergy  of  this  type  were,  from  Jane 
Austen's  novels.  Her  father  and  two  of  her  brothers  were 
clergymen.  Setting  aside  Mr.  Collins  as  somewhat  of  a  carica- 
ture, and  as  not  pertaining  to  the  gentleman  class,  we  have  Mr. 
Elton  in  Emma,  Edward  Bertram  and  the  gluttonous  Dr.  Grant 
in  Mansfield  Park,  Henry  Tilney  in  Northanger  Abbey,  and 
Edward  Ferrar  in  Sense  and  Sensibility.  These  were  all  men 
of  good  family  and  culture,  conscientious  as  far  as  their  light 
went,  who  looked  to  their  profession  as  a  means  of  living  com- 
fortably, with  very  little  to  do  ;  men  hardly  qualified  to  be  of 
any  spiritual  aid  to  their  flocks,  though  they  would  be  ready 
to  assist  them  in  their  material  needs. 

"  I  cannot  think,"  wrote  Anthony  Froude  in  1849,  "  why 
as  a  body  clergymen  are  so  fatally  uninteresting — they,  who 
through  all  their  waking  hours  ought  to  have  for  their  one 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES  121 


thought  the  deepest  and  most  absorbing  interests  of  humanity. 
It  is  the  curse  of  making  it  a  profession — a  road  to  get  on  upon, 
to  succeed  in  life  upon.  The  base  stain  is  apparent  in  their 
very  language,  too  sad  an  index  of  what  they  are.  Their  duty, 
what  is  it  ?  To  patter  through  the  two  Sunday  services.  For 
a  little  money  one  will  undertake  the  other's  duty  for  him.  And 
what  do  they  all  aim  at  ?  Getting  livings  !  Not  cures  of  souls, 
but  livings  •  something  which  will  keep  their  wretched  bodies 
living  in  the  comforts  they  have  found  indispensable.  What 
business  have  they,  any  one  of  them,  with  a  thought  of  what 
becomes  of  their  wretched  selves  at  all  ?  To  hear  them  preaching, 
to  hear  the  words  they  use  in  these  same  duties  of  theirs,  one 
would  suppose  they  really  believed  that  getting  on,  and  growing 
rich,  and  getting  comfortable  were  quite  the  last  thing  a  Chris- 
tian should  propose  for  himself.  Alas  !  with  the  mass  of  them 
the  pulpit  keeps  its  old  meaning,  and  is  but  a  stage.  Off  the 
stage  there  is  the  old  prate  of  the  old-world  stories,  the  patronage 
of  this  rich  man  and  that,  the  vacant  benefice  or  the  cathedral 
stall." 

This  is  hard,  and  unjust  as  well.  If  a  man  cannot  live  by 
bread  alone,  but  by  every  word  that  proceedeth  out  of  the  mouth 
of  God,  it  is  also  true  that  man  cannot  live  by  the  Word  alone, 
without  bread  to  put  into  his  mouth,  and  the  law  prohibited 
the  pastor  from  engaging  in  unprofessional  work,  as  S.  Paul 
maintained  himself  by  tent-making.  Besides,  surely  duty  may 
be  joyously  as  well  as  conscientiously  undertaken.  The  only 
part  in  the  above  stricture  that  is  fair  is  that  on  unreality  in  the 
pulpit.  According  to  Nelson's  signal  before  Trafalgar,  England 
expects  every  man  to  do  his  duty :  did  not  officers  and  sailors 
fight  zealously  with  all  their  hearts  in  that  great  battle,  although 
it  was  merely  duty  so  to  do  ?  The  well-to-do  clerics  did  their 
duty,  as  they  understood  it.  But  to  them  duty  had  a  very 
different  meaning  from  what  is  understood  by  the  clergy  of  the 
present  day.  With  them  duty  comprised  a  couple  of  services 
on  the  Lord's  Day,  with  services  also  at  Christmas  and  Good 
Friday,  baptizing  the  young,  visiting  the  sick,  as  also  giving 
marriage  benedictions.  They  had  no  conception  of  anything 
further. 

There  was  an  old  man,  long  ago  dead,  who  had  been  in  the 
service  of  our  family  through  three  generations.  He  told  me 
that  his  grandfather,  or  great-grandfather  (I  cannot  recall 
which)  had  been  bedridden  in  the  adjoining  parish  of  Maristowe 


122 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


for  twenty  years.  The  vicar  was  the  Rev.  John  Teasdale 
(1704-1755),  who  was  a  most  indefatigable  parish  priest  j  and 
Mr.  Teasdale  was  wont  during  those  twenty  years  to  visit  the  sick 
man  daily.  He  never  missed ,  weekday  or  Sunday  alike ,  to  read  to 
him  and  pray  with  him.  Of  this  Rev.  John  Teasdale  an  anecdote 
is  told  which,  though  not  illustrating  my  point,  I  will  relate. 
He  held  an  estate  on  lives  from  the  family  of  Harris  of  Hayne. 
A  life  dropped,  and  the  Hon.  John  Harris,  then  of  Hayne,  sent 
and  took  Mr.  Teasdale's  carriage  horses  as  a  heriot — an  act 
which,  though  legal,  was  considered  unhandsome.  On  Mr. 
Harris  sending  to  inquire  the  names  of  the  horses,  he  replied 
that  they  were  called  "  Honour  "  and  "  Conscience  "  when  in  his 
possession,  but  since  they  had  passed  into  other  hands,  the  present 
owner  had  better  impose  on  them  names  of  his  own  choice. 

Take  the  witness  of  the  Rev.  J.  M.  Cunningham,  Vicar  of 
Harrow,  an  Evangelical  of  the  Evangelicals,  looking  on  such  as 
did  not  belong  to  his  own  party  with  a  censorious  eye.  In  his 
book  The  Velvet  Cushion  he  speaks  of  the  systematic  visiting 
of  the  people  by  the  country  clergy.  The  old  Vicar  is  address- 
ing his  wife.  "  '  I  am  not  sure,'  said  the  Vicar, '  that  it  is  not  a 
presumptuous  reliance  on  the  goodness  of  God,  and  an  abuse  of 
the  doctrine  of  Divine  mercy,  that  has  kept  me  at  home  to-day, 
when  I  should  have  gone  to  visit  old  Dame  Wilkins  directly.' 
Her  bonnet  was  soon  on,  and  they  hobbled  down  the  village 
almost  as  fast  as  if  their  house  had  been  on  fire.  Mary  Wilkins 
was  a  poor,  good  woman,  to  whom  the  Vicar's  visit  three  times  a 
week  had  become  almost  one  of  the  necessities  of  life.  It  was 
now  two  hours  beyond  the  time  he  usually  came,  and,  had  she 
been  awake,  she  would  really  have  been  pained  by  the  delay. 
But  happily  she  had  fallen  into  a  profound  sleep,  and  when  he 
put  his  foot  on  the  threshold,  and  in  his  old-fashioned  way  said 
'  Peace  be  with  you,'  she  was  just  waking.  This  comforted  the 
good  man,  and,  as  he  well  knew  where  all  comfort  comes  from, 
he  thanked  God  in  his  heart  even  for  this." 

Or  take  Winthrop  Mackworth  Praed's  sketch  of  his  Vicar, 
in  Everyday  Characters — mind  you  everyday  characters.  Praed 
was  born  in  1802.  He  belonged  to  the  Young  Liberal  party, 
and  sat  in  Parliament  for  Yarmouth  in  1834  ;  he  died  in  1839. 

Some  years  ago,  ere  time  and  taste 

Had  turned  our  parish  topsy-turvy, 
When  Darnel  Park  was  Darnel  waste, 

And  roads  as  little  known  as  scurvy ; 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES  123 


The  man  who  lost  his  way  between 

St.  Mary's  Hill  and  Sandy  Thicket 
Was  always  shown  across  the  green, 

And  guided  to  the  Parson's  wicket. 

Whate'er  the  stranger's  caste  or  creed, 

Pundit  or  Papist,  saint  or  sinner, 
He  found  a  stable  for  his  steed, 

And  welcome  for  himself,  and  dinner. 

He  was  a  shrewd  and  sound  Divine, 

Of  loud  Dissent  the  mortal  terror  ; 
And  when,  by  dint  of  page  and  line, 

He  'stablished  truth,  or  startled  error, 
The  Baptist  found  him  far  too  deep  ; 

The  Deist  sighed  with  saving  sorrow  ; 
And  the  lean  Levite  went  to  sleep 

And  dreamed  of  tasting  pork  to-morrow. 

His  sermons  never  said  or  showed 

That  Earth  is  foul,  that  Heaven  is  gracious, 
Without  refreshment  on  the  road 

From  Jerome,  or  from  Athanasius. 
And  sure  a  righteous  zeal  inspired 

The  hand  and  head  that  penned  and  planned  them, 
For  all  who  understood  admired, 

And  some  who  did  not  understand  them. 

And  he  was  kind,  and  loved  to  sit 

In  the  low  hut  or  garnished  cottage, 
And  praise  the  farmer's  homely  wit 

And  share  the  widow's  homelier  pottage. 
At  his  approach  complaint  grew  mild, 

And  when  his  hand  unbarred  the  shutter, 
The  clammy  lips  of  fever  smiled 

The  welcome  which  they  could  not  mutter. 

Where  is  the  old  man  laid  ?  Look  down 

And  construe  on  the  slate  before  you  : 
Hie  jacet  Gulielmus  Brown, 

Vir  nulla  non  donandus  lauru. 


Although  the  majority  of  livings  were  poor,  there  was  a  certain 
number  that  were  "  fat,"  and  these  became  the  perquisite  of 
men  of  good  family  and  of  political  influence.  Dr.  Valpy  was 
headmaster  of  Reading  School,  and  Rector  of  Stradishall  in 
Suffolk,  for  twenty  years.  The  rich  living  of  Stanhope  had  been 
held  in  succession  by  three  prelates,  when  its  rector,  Dr.  Phillpotts, 
was  made  Bishop  of  Exeter  in  1830.  There  was  a  bit  of  an 
outcry  at  this,  and  he  resigned  Stanhope  and  took  in  its  stead 


124 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


a  canonry  in  Durham.1  "  Bishop  Courtenay  held  the  living  of 
S.  George's,  Hanover  Square,  with  a  population  of  430,396; 
Bishop  Pelham  a  living  in  Sussex,  and  Bishop  Bethell  a  living  in 
Yorkshire,  each  with  the  see  of  Exeter."2 

These  incumbencies  were,  of  course,  served  by  curates. 

In  1762  William,  Viscount  Courtenay,  ran  away  with  Frances, 
daughter  of  a  taverner  named  Clack  at  Wallingford,  and  married 
her  in  Edinburgh.  The  publican  said  to  him,  "  My  lord,  you 
have  married  my  daughter.  Now  you  must  do  something  for 
my  son."  "  What  can  I  do  ?  I  have  nothing  I  can  give  him 
but  some  livings.  He  must  go  into  the  Church."  Accordingly 
the  cub  was  sent  to  Oxford,  where  he  managed  to  pass  ;  he  was 
subsequently  ordained  and  given  three  livings — Powderham, 
Moretonhampstead,  and  Woolborough,  that  includes  the  town 
of  Newton  Abbot.  He  chose  to  live  at  the  Rectory  in  the 
park  at  Powderham,  but  his  behaviour  made  him  so  insufferable, 
that  he  was  required  to  quit  it,  and  then  he  went  to  live  at 
Moretonhampstead . 

Too  many  scandalous  jobs  were  effected,  but  the  majority 
of  presentations  were  honestly  made.  A  country  squire  liked 
to  have  near  him  as  closest  neighbour  a  gentleman,  and  one  who 
would  not  cause  scandal  in  the  parish. 

Where  pluralists  were  in  possession,  there  the  curate  had 
the  care  of  souls.  Sydney  Smith  described  him  as  he  saw  him. 
"  A  curate — there  is  something  which  excites  compassion  in  the 
very  name  of  a  curate  !  A  learned  man  in  a  hovel,  with  sermons 
and  saucepans,  lexicons  and  bacon,  Hebrew  books  and  ragged 
children  ;  good  and  patient,  a  comforter,  and  a  preacher,  the  first 
and  purest  pauper  in  the  hamlet." 

Here  is  Washington  Irving's  account  of  a  country  church 
and  a  vicar  of  the  parish  in  a  plump  living  : 

"  The  congregation  was  composed  of  the  neighbouring  people 
of  rank,  who  sat  in  pews  sumptuously  lined  and  cushioned, 
furnished  with  richly  gilded  prayer  books,  and  decorated  with 
their  arms  upon  the  pew  doors  ;  of  the  villagers  and  peasantry, 
who  filled  the  back  seats,  and  a  small  gallery  beside  the  organ  ; 

1  But  the  see  of  Exeter  was  badly  endowed.  Bishop  Voysey  (1519- 
J^1).  of  twenty-five  manors  and  fourteen  mansions,  was  despoiled  of  all 
save  eight.  Burnet  says  of  him  that  he  received  a  pension  for  life,  but 
"  all  the  rest  he  basely  resigned,  taking  care  of  himself  and  ruining  his 
successors." 

2  Overton  :  The  English  Church  in  the  Nineteenth  Century  (1894),  P-  7- 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES  125 


and  of  the  poor  of  the  parish,  who  were  ranged  on  benches  in 
the  aisles. 

M  The  service  was  performed  by  a  snuffling,  well-fed  vicar, 
who  had  a  snug  dwelling  near  the  church.  He  was  a  privileged 
guest  at  all  the  tables  of  the  neighbourhood,  and  had  been  the 
keenest  fox-hunter  in  the  county  ;  until  age  and  good  living 
had  disabled  him  from  doing  anything  more  than  ride  to  see  the 
hounds  throw  off,  and  make  one  at  the  hunt  dinner. 

'*  Under  the  ministry  of  such  a  pastor,  I  found  it  impossible 
to  get  into  the  train  of  thought  suitable  to  the  time  and  place."  1 

The  parson  was  doubtless  a  rector  and  not  a  vicar.  An 
American  would  not  know  the  distinction. 

The  clergy  of  the  Hanoverian  and  Early  Victorian  period 
were  divided  into  distinct  classes — the  well-born,  well-bred  and 
well-beneficed,and  the  poor  curates  who  lived  on  the  crumbs  that 
fell  from  the  tables  of  the  well-to-do  men  of  the  same  cloth. 
Some  of  them  were  scholarly,  some  no  doubt  boors,  each  well- 
content  by  marrying  a  farmer's  or  a  yeoman's  daughter,  to 
receive  with  her  a  dower  that  would  enable  him  to  keep  a  cow, 
a  pig,  and  cocks  and  hens. 

The  poverty  of  the  livings  was  due  to  several  causes.  All 
the  great  tithes  of  the  vicarages  had  gone  to  abbeys,  many 
of  them  out  of  England ;  and  at  the  Reformation  these  were 
appropriated  by  the  Crown  or  given  to  favourites  ;  and  the 
small  tithes  which  had  served  to  maintain  a  chaplain  without 
incumbrances  were  quite  insufficient  to  support  a  resident  vicar 
with  wife  and  family.  Moreover,  in  the  reigns  of  Henry  VIII, 
of  Edward  VI,  and  of  Elizabeth,  the  livings  were  plundered  in 
the  most  shameless  fashion. 

But  there  were  other  ways  in  which  they  were  reduced  in 
value.  To  what  extent  I  cannot  say,  but  to  some  extent,  simony 
was  practised,  and  an  incumbent  paid  his  patron  for  presentation 
by  alienating  to  him  a  portion  of  the  glebe.  Thus,  in  the  parish 
of  Coryton  adjoining  mine,  there  was  a  good  farm  that  belonged 
to  the  Church,  also  ninety  acres  of  "  sanctuary  land."  Both 
the  farm  and  the  major  portion  of  the  sanctuary  land  were 
made  over  to  the  patron,  probably  by  the  Rev.  John  Rice,  who 
was  appointed  in  1778  and  died  in  1799,  for  in  the  register  his 
successor  entered  after  his  name  : 

This  was  a  grateful  Priest,  whose  wealth,  tho'  small, 
He  to  his  Patron  gave  who  gave  him  all. 

1  The  Sketch-book  (1821),  i.  176. 


126 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Moreover,  rectors  and  vicars  for  a  lump  sum  of  money  would 
make  over  glebe  farms  on  lives,  upon  a  nominal  rent.  In  another 
neighbouring  parish,  the  incoming  rector  found  that  this  had 
been  done  in  a  wholesale  manner,  greatly  impoverishing  the 
living.  A  few  years  ago,  only  just  before  such  an  act  became 
illegal,  a  neighbouring  rector  who  was  leaving  for  another 
living  transferred  to  the  lives  of  his  children  three  of  the  best 
farms  on  the  glebe. 

Most  of  the  bishoprics  had  been  sorely  robbed  in  the  reigns 
of  Edward  VI  and  Elizabeth,  so  that  some  bishops  were  com- 
pelled to  be  pluralists,  as  the  revenues  of  their  sees  would  not 
support  them.  Some  of  the  worst  offenders  were  the  Marian 
bishops,  who  on  the  accession  of  Elizabeth  set  to  work  to  make 
fortunes  for  themselves  by  alienating  estates  of  the  Church. 
They  conveyed  manors  to  women,  children,  relatives,  by  lease, 
or  sold  them.  Fuller  says,  "  Many  bishoprics  of  the  realm  had 
they  so  impoverished  by  these  means,  that  some  of  the  new 
bishops  had  scarce  a  corner  of  a  house  to  lie  in,  and  divers  not 
so  much  ground  as  to  graze  a  goose  or  a  sheep,  so  that  some  were 
compelled  to  tether  their  horses  in  their  orchard."  The  Eliza- 
bethan bishops  were  every  bit  as  bad.  Cox  of  Ely  scandalously 
robbed  his  see.  Barlow,  Bishop  of  S.  David's,  ripped  the  lead- 
work  off  the  palaces  of  S.  David's  and  Llawhaden.  He  was 
transferred  to  Bath  and  Wells,  where  was  the  noble  Lady  Chapel, 
said  to  be  the  finest  Perpendicular  building  in  the  West  of  Eng- 
land. Barlow  sold  it,  lead- roof,  stones  and  all.  Bishop  Aylmer 
of  London  cut  down  the  elms  at  Fulham  to  the  extent  of  £6,000, 
an  enormous  sum  in  those  days.  I  give  particulars  of  the 
proceedings  of  Edmund  Seamier,  made  Bishop  of  Peterborough 
in  1560.  He  for  ever  alienated  from  his  see  the  hundred  of 
Nessaburgh,  the  Manors  of  Thirlby  and  Southorpe,  without 
receiving  any  recompense,  but  so  as  to  prepare  a  way  for  his 
translation  to  a  better  bishopric — viz.  Norwich. 

Other  properties  belonging  to  the  see  that  he  sold  were  as 
below.    The  proceeds  went  into  his  own  pocket. 

i     *■  d. 

Parcel  of  Borough  Berrie  Manor  sold  to  Walter  Pye  for  .  467  9  6 
Parcel  of  Thwaites  Manor  sold  to  Robert  Henson  for  .  82  o  o 
Parcel  of  Borough  Berrie  Manor  sold  to  John  Bellamy  for  389  19  10 
The  Episcopal  Palace  at  Peterborough  sold  to  James  Russell  3,122  o  o 
Three  tenements  in  Peterborough  Court,  London,  sold  to 

Wm.  Stamford  and  R.  Brown  for  ....  459  10  0 
Parcel  of  Berrie  Manor  sold  to  Thomas  Baynard  for        .       146    6  o 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES  127 


/ 

s. 

d. 

Four  tenements  in  Peterborough  Court  sold  to  Edw.  Wood- 

ford 

0 

0 

A  TYiAQdn p crp  in  T^loo-t-  Q-(-rpP'+  <;r>lr1  +r>  TrwpnVi  PhywpI  1  fnr 

lULOjaaJ^     111     -L   ICLt                              OU1U     IU      1  UJL  UJ1     V_yW^Wv  wll    1  Ul  • 

71 

D 

0 

Gunthorpe  and  Thwaites  Manors  sold  to  George  Smith  for  . 

D 

-? 
j 

5 

Witherington  Manor  sold  to  Sir  W.  Roberts  for       .  . 

I  077 

IO 

6 

Feefarm  of  Thirlby  Manor  sold  to  Henry  Price  for  . 

i,"3 

IO 

O 

Eye  Manor  sold  to  John  Bellamy  for 

968 

I 

8 

The  Bell,  Center  Lane,  London,  sold  to  Tho.  Masson  for  . 

780 

IO 

0 

Manor  of  Borough  Berrie  sold  to  Walker  S.  John,  John 

Thurlow,  Thos.  Matthews  for  . 

2,982 

13 

9 

Total  sale  of  lands,  ^12,729  13s.  n%d. 


But  to  return  to  the  Hanoverian  period  of  the  History  of  the 
Church. 

A  recently  published  volume  of  eighteenth-century  letters 
exhibits  Georgian  religious  apathy  at  what  must  surely  have 
been  its  lowest  point.  "  Can  it  be  expected,"  writes  a  country 
rector  to  his  brother  in  1780,  "  that  a  proper  regard  to  Religion 
will  be  kept  up  by  the  appearance  of  it  one  single  hour  in  the 
week,  which  is  the  case  of  half  the  country  parishes  in  the  King- 
dom ?  •  The  Proprietor  sells  the  Living,  which  consists  entirely  of 
Glebe ;  the  Purchaser  considers  how  to  make  the  best  use  of  his 
money,  reduces  the  Duty  to  one,  and  that  in  the  afternoon, 
hires  a  Curate  who  resides  in  the  nearest  Market  Town,  who, 
being  barely  paid  for  Sunday  duty,  thinks  himself  under  no 
obligation  to  do  more,  and  arrives  dirty  and  fatigued  at  a  ruined 
Edifice.  Disfigured  by  torn  and  draggled  surplice,  he  mounts 
the  desk  and  labours  to  edify  souls  by  reading  the  statute 
service,  rendered  less  intelligible  by  tropes  and  figures  with  which 
he  tries  to  embellish  it  in  his  sermon,  all  his  Arguments  being 
unsupported  by  the  inestimable  influence  of  Example." 

The  parish  of  Lydford,  the  largest  in  England,  comprising 
50,751  acres — mostly  indeed  Dartmoor,  but  yet  with  Prince 
Town  in  it  numbering  a  considerable  population,  and  Lydford 
itself,  distant  from  Prince  Town  nearly  fifteen  miles  by  road, 
was  held  for  a  great  many  years  by  the  Rev.  Dr.  Fletcher.  This 
Fletcher  was  also  Rector  of  Southhill  in  Cornwall,  one  of  the 
richest  livings  in  the  county,  worth  some  £594  per  annum — 
twenty-five  miles  from  Lydford,  he  held  with  this  the  church 
and  rectory  situated  three  miles  from  the  town  of  Callington, 
also  in  the  parish.  For  many  years  I  knew  the  successive 
curates  of  Lydford,  but  never  heard  of  Dr.  Fletcher  visiting 
the  place  to  take  duty  in  it.    The  chancel  roof  was  in  holes, 


128 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


and  on  one  Christmas  Day  the  holy  table  was  spread  with  a 
covering  of  snow. 

In  my  own  parish,  the  Rector,  the  Rev.  Mr.  Elford,  was  non- 
resident. He  lived  nine  miles  off,  at  Tavistock.  When  the 
Bishop  demurred  to  this,  "  How  can  I  live,"  said  he,  "  in  a  place 
where  there  is  no  barber  to  trim  my  wig  ?  "  And  this  was 
accepted  as  sufficient  excuse. 

From  1795  to  181 1  Elford  held  as  well  the  curacy  of  Coryton 
under  the  Rev.  R.  V.  Willesford,  who  was  a  pluralist  Rector. 
This  man  was  also  Vicar  of  Brentor,  Vicar  of  Awlescombe,  near 
Honiton,  curate  of  Tavistock,  and  headmaster  of  the  Tavistock 
Grammar  School  from  1795  to  1821. 

In  this  parish  of  Lew  Trenchard,  Elford  had  a  curate,  ap- 
pointed in  1820,  the  Rev.  Caddy  Thomas,  who,  I  believe,  ended 
his  days  in  the  Virgin  Islands.  He  lived  in  the  Rectory,  and 
had  a  pupil  with  whom  he  was  often  at  variance,  breaking  out 
into  fierce  quarrels.  The  gardener- groom  and  his  wife,  named 
Adams,  occupied  a  portion  of  the  house,  and  she  cooked  and 
served  and  was  housemaid  as  well.  One  day  Adams  heard 
screams  of  rage  and  blows  in  the  library,  and  rushed  in  to  find 
that  Caddy  Thomas  had  knocked  the  pupil  down,  and  whether 
to  drive  information  into  his  head  I  cannot  say,  but  he  had  him 
on  the  ground  and  was  pounding  his  head  with  the  handle  of  a 
clasp  knife.  Adams  wrenched  the  curate  away  and  locked  him 
into  the  study ;  then  he  carried  the  pupil  upstairs,  washed  the 
blood  from  his  head,  locked  him  into  the  bedroom,  and  hastened 
to  the  stable,  where  he  saddled  two  nags.  Then  he  brought 
forth  the  pupil,  mounted  him  on  one,  himself  on  the  other,  rode 
away  with  him,  and  deposited  him  with  his  relatives. 

The  Rector  of  East  Mersea  in  Essex  was  non-resident.  He 
visited  the  parish  once  only  in  the  year,  to  collect  his  tithes. 
But  he  had  a  curate  who  took  the  duty  there  and  also  in  two 
other  churches  with  non-resident  incumbents,  on  the  mainland. 
Mersea  is  an  island  connected  with  the  mainland  by  a  causeway 
that  is  covered  by  the  sea  only  at  very  high  tides.  Immediately 
after  morning  service  at  East  Mersea,  the  curate  had  a  horse 
brought  to  the  churchyard  gate,  where  he  mounted  and  galloped 
as  hard  as  he  could  spur  to  the  nearest  church  on  the  mainland, 
took  there  a  second  morning  prayer,  dined  with  a  farmer,  and 
then  rode  off  to  the  third  church  for  afternoon  service.  "  He 
was  a  right  parson  of  the  good  sort,"  said  the  aged  clerk  to 
me ;  "he  did  leave  us  so  gloriously  alone." 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES  129 


Hannah  More  gives  an  account  of  the  usual  state  of  things 
in  regard  to  non-residence  at  the  close  of  the  eighteenth  century 
and  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth.  "  The  vicarage  of  Cheddar 
is  in  the  gift  of  the  Dean  of  Wells.  The  value  nearly  fifty  pounds 
per  annum.  The  incumbent  is  a  Mr.  R.,who  has  something  to 
do,  but  I  cannot  find  out  what,  in  the  University  of  Oxford, 
where  he  resides.  The  curate  lives  at  Wells,  twelve  miles 
distant.  They  have  only  service  once  a  week,  and  there  is 
scarcely  an  instance  of  a  poor  person  being  visited  or  prayed  with. 
The  living  of  Axb ridge — annual  value  about  fifty  pounds.  The 
incumbent  about  sixty  years  of  age.  Mr.  G.  is  intoxicated  about 
six  times  a  week,  and  very  frequently  is  prevented  from  preach- 
ing by  two  black  eyes,  honestly  earned  by  fighting.  We  have 
in  this  neighbourhood  thirteen  adjoining  parishes  without  so 
much  as  even  a  resident  curate.  No  clergyman  has  resided  in 
this  parish  for  forty  years.  One  rode  over  three  miles  from 
Wells  to  preach  once  on  a  Sunday,  but  no  weekly  duty  was  done 
or  sick  persons  visited,  and  children  were  often  buried  without 
any  funeral  service.  Eight  people  in  the  morning  and  twenty  in 
the  afternoon  was  a  good  congregation." 

Dean  Hole  in  his  Memoirs  tells  us  that  the  Vicar  of  Strood 
was  a  pluralist  and  lived  far  away  on  his  other  benefice.  Once 
only  did  he  take  it  into  his  head  to  visit  Strood,  but  as  he  entered 
the  place  was  so  disgusted  with  the  smell  from  a  basket  of  stale 
shrimps  offered  for  sale,  that  he  turned  his  horse's  head  and 
went  back  to  his  sweeter  cure.  "  Our  curate,"  he  writes,  "  who 
lived  five  miles  away,  rode  over  for  one  dreary  service  on  the 
Sunday,  dined,  and  we  saw  him  no  more  during  the  week." 

But  even  in  some  places  where  the  clergy  did  reside,  there 
was  disgraceful  neglect.  At  Stamford,  where  are  five  churches, 
William  Wilberforce,  when  visiting  it  in  1798,  records  :  "  This 
seems  a  sad,  careless  place.  I  talked  to  several  common  people. 
At  church  miserable  work.  Remnant  of  Sunday-school,  only 
eight  children.  I  have  seldom  seen  a  more  apparently  irreligious 
place.  A  shopkeeper  said  none  of  the  clergy  were  active,  or 
went  among  the  poor." 

A  notable  change,  however,  took  place  in  the  Church.  The 
French  Revolution,  the  Reform  Bill,  had  shown  the  Church  that, 
as  Lord  Grey  had  warned  her,  "  she  must  set  her  house  in  order." 
Miss  Mitford,  in  Belford  Regis  (1835),  wrote  :  "  Of  late  years  there 
has  been  a  prodigious  change  in  the  body  clerical.  The  activity 
of  the  dissenters,  the  spread  of  education,  and  the  immense 
9 


130 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


increase  of  population,  to  say  nothing  of  that  word  of  power, 
Reform,  have  combined  to  produce  a  stirring  spirit  of  emulation 
amongst  the  younger  clergy  which  has  quite  changed  the  aspect 
of  the  profession.  Heretofore  the  Church  militant  was  the 
quietest  and  easiest  of  all  vocations  ;  and  the  most  slender  and 
ladylike  young  gentleman,  the  '  Mamma's  Darling'  of  a  great 
family,  whose  lungs  were  too  tender  for  the  bar,  and  whose  frame 
was  too  delicate  for  the  army,  might  be  sent  with  perfect  comfort 
to  the  snug  curacy  of  a  neighbouring  parish,  to  read  Horace, 
cultivate  auriculas,  christen,  marry,  and  bury,  about  twice  a 
quarter,  and  do  duty  every  Sunday.  Now  times  are  altered  : 
prayers  must  be  read  and  sermons  preached  twice  a  day  at  least, 
not  forgetting  lectures  in  Lent,  and  homilies  at  tide  times  ; 
workhouses  are  to  be  visited,  boys  and  girls  taught  in  the 
morning  and  grown-up  bumpkins  in  the  evening  ;  children  are 
to  be  catechised  ;  masters  and  mistresses  looked  after ;  hymn- 
books  distributed  ;  Bibles  given  away,  tract  societies  fostered 
amongst  the  zealous,  and  psalmody  cultivated  amongst  the 
musical.  In  short,  a  curate  nowadays,  even  a  country  curate, 
much  more  if  his  parish  lie  in  a  great  town,  has  need  of  the  lungs 
of  a  barrister  in  good  practice,  and  the  strength  of  an  officer  of 
dragoons." 

Confirmation  had  been  sadly  neglected,  or  not  properly  pre- 
pared for.  I  heard  of  an  old  parson  who,  when  a  period  of 
preparation  for  this  rite  approached,  got  some  tracts  about  it, 
gave  them  to  the  candidates,  with  "  There,  read  that  and  you  will 
understand  more  about  it  than  I  do." 

The  brother  of  the  late  Sir  Morell  Mackenzie  was  on  one 
occasion  talking  about  the  preparation  for  Confirmation  he  had 
from  his  vicar.  A  day  or  two  before  the  Confirmation  Mr. 
Mackenzie  went  to  see  the  incumbent  of  the  parish  with  a  view 
to  being  confirmed.  After  some  desultory  chat  the  vicar  said, 
"  What  sort  of  crop  of  apples  have  you  had  this  year  ?  "  "Oh," 
was  the  reply,  "  we  had  a  very  good  crop,  very  good  indeed." 
"  Ah,"  said  the  Vicar,  "  that  is  capital.  Our  crop  was  small, 
and  the  apples  not  at  all  good."  Then  he  added,  "  By  the  way, 
you  know  your  catechism,  I  suppose  ?  "  "  Oh,  yes,"  was  the 
reply,  "  I  knew  it  by  heart,  long  ago."  u  Well,  the  Confirmation 
is  next  Wednesday.  Be  there  in  good  time."  That  was  all  the 
preparation  the  would-be  Confirmee  had  from  his  vicar ! 

Here  is  an  extract  from  Mr.  Paul  Treby's  MS.  Diary,  now 
in  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Clark  of  Efford  Manor,  near  Plymouth. 


CONFIRMATION  IN  THE  FORTIES 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES  131 


The  incident  took  place  during  the  march  of  his  militia  to 
Winchester. 

"  July  i8ii,  Famham. — The  wine  here  is  excellent.  '  Good 
wine  needs  no  bush,'  so  pull  down  your  sign,  Mr.  Landlord. 
There  was  a  Confirmation  and  a  Visitation  in  the  town.  Many 
drunken  Parsons,  and  a  few  drunken  officers. " 

In  Devon  and  Cornwall,  comprising  the  diocese  of  Exeter, 
confirmations  were  held  only  in  the  principal  towns,  and  then 
only  when  something  like  a  thousand  candidates  could  be  secured 
at  a  time  from  the  surrounding  parishes.  In  the  Life  of  Bishop 
Wilberforce  an  anecdote  is  given  of  an  innkeeper  who  sought  to 
obtain  compensation  from  the  Bishop,  because  the  candidates  for 
Confirmation  no  longer  attended  a  ball  in  the  evening  given  in 
honour  of  the  occasion,  as  he  had  been  wont  to  provide  one 
during  the  time  of  Bishop  Wilberforce's  predecessor.  And  it  is 
said  that  the  wife  of  a  bishop  in  the  West  was  accustomed 
regularly  to  give  a  dance  upon  the  day  of  Confirmation  in  the 
cathedral  city,  at  the  palace,  saying  that  it  was  a  pity  so  many 
young  people  should  be  brought  together  without  affording  them 
the  opportunity  of  enjoying  themselves. 

It  is  stated  of  Bishop  North  that  he  once  examined  (or  pre- 
tended to  examine)  his  candidates  for  Holy  Orders  in  the  cricket 
field,  while  watching  the  progress  of  the  match. 

An  old  incumbent  in  the  North,  who  has  now  passed  away, 
the  Rev.  John  Sharp  of  Horbury,  whose  curate  I  was,  used  to 
tell  the  story  of  his  ordination.  "  Well,  Mr.  Sharp,"  said  the 
Archbishop  in  his  only  interview  with  the  candidate,  "  so  you 
are  going  to  be  curate  to  your  father,  Mr.  Sharp  of  Wakefield. 
Make  my  compliments  to  him  when  you  go  home.  My  secretary 
has  your  testimonials ;  he  will  give  you  full  instructions.  Be 
sure  to  be  at  the  Minster  in  good  time.    Good  morning." 

Bishop  Pelham  (1807-27)  examined  a  candidate  for  Holy 
Orders  by  sending  a  message  to  him  by  his  butler  to  write  an 
essay  on  some  given  subject,  and  then  post  it  to  him.  On  the 
other  hand,  Bishop  Marsh  of  Peterborough  (1819-39),  in  his 
determination  to  stamp  Calvinism  out  of  the  diocese,  proposed 
eighty-seven  questions  to  candidates  for  Ordination  and  licences. 
He  drew  down  upon  himself  thereby  a  bitter  attack  in  the 
Edinburgh  Review. 

I  will  now  give  a  few  instances — to  be  supplemented  later  when 
I  come  to  speak  of  Progress — of  the  infrequency  of  Celebrations 
of  Holy  Communion  :  The  vicarage  of  Sheepstor  had  not  always 


132 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


a  resident  incumbent.  A  Mr.  Smith  was  Vicar  of  Bickleigh  as 
well,  and  divine  service  was  performed  at  the  former  place  once 
only  in  three  weeks.  In  the  Book  of  Parish  Accounts  we  find  in 
1809  the  sum  of  £1  13s.  5^.  for  eight  bottles  of  wine.  In  1812, 
for  four  bottles  for  the  Sacrament  and  five  for  the  minister, 
£2.  After  this  entry  there  is  no  specification  for  wine,  but 
for  Mr.  Smith's  account.  In  1824  it  amounted  to  £3  15s.  6d. 
The  Holy  Communion  was  celebrated  four  times  in  the  year, 
then  it  declined  to  three  times,  and  finally,  in  1835  and  after, 
to  once  only.  In  a  charge  delivered  by  Dr.  Horsley,  Bishop  of 
Rochester,  in  1800,  he  urged  :  "  Four  celebrations  in  the  year  are 
the  very  fewest  that  ought  to  be  allowed  in  the  very  smallest 
parishes.  It  were  to  be  wished  that  it  were  in  all  more  frequent." 
At  Launceston,  a  considerable  market  town,  the  Holy  Communion 
was  celebrated  only  monthly.  It  may  not  be  uninteresting  to 
give  a  couple  of  sketches  of  old-fashioned  parsons  belonging  to 
an  extinct  type  whom  I  have  known. 

There  was  one  in  the  West,  a  white-haired  man,  singularly 
like  John  Bright,  for  whom  he  was  often  mistaken,  a  widower, 
who  wore  stays,  and  thought  himself  a  lady-killer.  Wherever 
there  were  young  and  pretty  girls  he  would  drive  over  and  pre- 
sent himself  as  a  suitor,  always  to  meet  with  a  rebuff.  Indeed, 
he  was  commonly  called  the  Oft-rejected.  Usually  on  every 
Monday  morning  he  might  be  seen  at  the  nearest  station,  leaving 
by  the  first  train  for  town,  or  to  visit  some  congenial  friends, 
heavy  port-drinkers,  narrators  of  good,  but  not  always  par- 
ticularly choice  stories,  and  card-players.  He  would  return  to  his 
parish  on  the  Saturday  afternoon.  He  could  not  be  persuaded 
to  have  a  celebration  of  the  Holy  Communion  on  Christmas 
Day,  but  he  did  not  miss  having  one  on  his  own  birthday.  His 
sole  idea  of  a  reredos  above  the  altar  was  a  huge  representation  of 
his  family  arms — not  that  his  family  had  other  than  a  fictitious 
antiquity,  and  never  had  been  of  any  importance. 

Another  parson  whom  I  knew  very  well,  as  he  was  a  near 
neighbour  of  mine,  was  in  Yorkshire.  He  was  old  when  I  made 
his  acquaintance,  a  bachelor  in  a  very  large  house  in  a  park, 
that  had  been  a  family  mansion  which  had  been  made  over  to  the 
Church  as  a  rectory  when  the  original  owners  moved  away. 
We  will  call  him  Underwood.    He  had  been  tutor  to  a  former 

Viscount  D  .  He  was  attended  by  two  worthy  servant-maids, 

who  sometimes  walked  over  to  my  church. 

"  My  Rebecca  and  Betsy  were  with  you  last  Sunday,"  said  the 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES  133 


old  gentleman  to  me  one  day.  "  Ah,  they're  good  girls  and 
varra  fond  o'  Sacraments  and  all  that  sort  of  thing."  I  may 
mention  that  he  talked  broad  Yorkshire,  although  a  ripe  scholar, 
and  had  Horace  at  his  fingers'  ends,  and  would  quote  to  his 
bucolic  parishioners,  regardless  of  the  fact  that  they  could  not 
understand  him. 

One  day  when  I  called  I  was  informed  that  he  had  a  touch 
of  the  gout  and  was  confined  to  his  bedroom.  As  I  ascended  the 
staircase  I  encountered  two  women,  one  with  a  baby,  descending. 
"  I've  been  having  a  baptism  and  a  churching,"  said  he,  when  I 
entered  and  saw  him  reclining  in  an  embroidered  dressing-gown 
in  his  easy  chair  with  his  leg  up.  "  I  daresay  you  saw  the 
parties  leaving." 

Usually  baptisms  were  performed  in  the  houses  of  the  parents. 
If  the  happy  father  was  a  labourer  he  would  invite  the  farmer 
for  whom  he  worked  to  come,  bring  a  bottle  of  gin  and  sit  over 
the  fire  with  the  parson,  so  soon  as  the  ceremony  was  over.  At 
a  farmhouse,  the  table  was  laid  with  spirits,  tumblers,  pipes, 
and  a  pack  of  cards,  and  so  soon  as  the  child  was  baptized  the 
farmer  with  two  friends  and  the  rector  sat  down  and  made  a 
night  of  it. 

On  such  occasions  his  housekeeper  was  wont  to  leave  the 
study  window  unhasped,  so  that  Mr.  Underwood  might  let 
himself  in  by  throwing  up  the  sash  and  climbing  over  the  sill. 
Below  the  window  was  a  violet  bed,  that  had  suffered  through 
being  trampled  on  upon  such  occasions,  and  with  the  parson 
one  night  having  slept  in  it,  unable  to  get  the  sash  up,  or  throw 
his  leg  over  the  sill. 

One  Good  Friday  the  rector  was  in  bed  at  eleven  when  his 
wooden-legged  clerk  came  stumping  into  the  room,  out  of  breath, 
to  say  that  his  Lordship  had  walked  over  to  service.  "  Run 
round,"  said  Mr.  Underwood,  "  scrape  together  a  few  farmers.  I 
shall  be  dressed  in  a  jiffy." 

Viscountess  D  once  invited  him  to  stay  for  a  few  days  at 

the  Park.  "  I'll  bring  some  of  my  Jargonelle  pears,"  said  he. 
A  few  minutes  later  he  returned  to  the  parlour  with  a  little 
handbasket,  in  which  all  that  was  visible  was  pears.  "  You'll 
require  some  luggage,  I  suppose  ?  "  said  her  Ladyship.  "  Nay,  my 
Leddy,  I've  all  I  want  here."  "  But,  surely,  that  will  hardly 
suffice  for  the  inside  of  a  week  ?  "  He  considered  for  a  moment 
and  then  said,  "  I'll  just  go  and  get  some  more  Jargonelles." 

On  another  occasion  he  was  invited  to  spend  a  few  days  at 


134 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


B  Hall.    After  a  couple  of  days  he  made  his  farewell  and 

disappeared.  Three  days  later,  the  lady  of  the  house,  hearing 
somewhat  uproarious  merriment  in  the  kitchen,  descended,  and 
found  Mr.  Underwood  there.  After  having  been  the  guest  in  the 
parlour,  he  had  been  invited  to  the  servants'  hall  by  the  butler. 
He  was  a  kindly  and  hospitable  old  man ,  and  was  much  liked  by 
his  parishioners.  When  I  knew  him  he  had  become  somewhat 
slatternly,  and  his  housekeeper  had  difficulty  in  keeping  him 
approximately  tidy.  She  complained  to  me,  that  if  she  insisted 
on  his  having  a  clean  neckcloth  he  threw  a  lot  of  Latin  at  her — 
and  that  frightened  her,  as  she  could  not  understand  it,  and 
thought  they  were  bad  words. 

The  one-legged  clerk  died  whilst  I  was  in  the  neighbourhood, 
and  the  duties  of  clerk  and  sexton  combined  were  carried  on  by 
his  widow.  At  the  approach  of  Easter  it  occurred  to  the  woman 
or  to  the  rector  that  some  decoration  would  be  appropriate, 
and  she  consulted  him  as  to  the  nature  of  the  floral  adornment. 
"  Well,  now,"  said  he,  "  as  you've  lost  your  husband,  it  would 
be  suitable  to  wreathe  his  crutch  in  ivy  and  set  it  up  at  the  East 
end  o'  one  side  o'  the  Communion."  "  And  what  on  the  other 
side  ?  "  inquired  the  sextoness.  He  mused  and  presently  said, 
"  Ye  might  cut  out  o'  stiff  white  paper  the  jaws  o'  Death, 
wi'  mighty  white  fangs,  and  stitch  together  laurel  leaves  for  the 
gums.  It  strikes  me  it  would  be  a  neat,  poetical  and  varra 
appropriate  symbol  for  Easter,  and  for  the  loss  of  Joe  (the 
deceased  sexton)."  I  went  over  shortly  after  to  take  an  occa- 
sional service  for  Mr.  Underwood,  and  this  amazing  decoration 
figured  at  the  East  end  of  the  chancel. 

I  called  during  Lent  one  year  to  propose  that  he  should  preach 
for  me  one  week-day.  I  thought  perhaps  it  might  do  him  some 
good  to  see  how  church  matters  were  elsewhere.  "  Look  here," 
said  he,  "I'll  put  a  bottle  o'  good  port  on  the  table — and  you 
overhaul  my  sermons  in  the  lower  drawer  yonder,  and  choose 
which  you  will  have.  I  must  go  out  for  half  an  hour.  John  Dale 
asked  me  to  look  at  a  cow  he's  bought." 

I  did  read  or  rather  skim  through  some  of  his  discourses: 
there  was  hardly  any  Christianity  in  them,  and  I  could  select 
none — there  is  no  choice  in  rotten  apples.  When  he  returned, 
I  told  him  that  I  must  leave  the  selection  to  himself.  Happily, 
when  the  day  came,  a  note  reached  me  to  say  he  had  an  attack 
of  the  gout  and  prayed  to  be  excused. 

The  condition  of  most  of  the  churches  in  country  places 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES  135 


was  deplorable :  the  walls  stained  and  the  altarcloth  mildewed 
and  moth-eaten,  no  hassocks  on  which  to  kneel,  the  Prayer  Book 
and  Bible  of  the  minister  tumbling  out  of  their  bindings  through 
damp.  Such  as  had  attention  paid  to  them  were  done  up  to 
look  neat  and  comfortable,  without  taste  or  reverence.  I  remem- 
ber going  to  see  a  church  near  Cambridge,  and  remarked  to  the 
sexton  that  the  parson  had  no  kneeling-stool.  "  Don't  want 
one,"  said  he  ;  "  he  alius  balances  hisself  between  his  chest  and 
the  end  of  his  backbone,  when  he's  prayin'." 

Very  often  the  font  was  made  a  receptacle  for  dusters,  which 
however  never  seemed  to  have  been  used.  Cobwebs  hung  from 
the  ceilings,  bats  occupied  the  church  roof  and  left  stains  on  the 
floor  and  seats,  mice  had  bored  their  way  in,  in  futile  expectation 
of  finding  there  something  to  eat.  A  writer  in  the  Christian 
Remembrancer  in  1841  compares  the  churches,  for  the  neglect 
into  which  they  had  fallen,  to  the  abandoned  temples  of  an 
effete  paganism.  "  If  dirt  and  damp,  if  crumbling  rafters  and 
tottering  walls,  if  systematic  neglect  and  wanton  mutilation 
were  to  be  found  in  the  one  case,  most  assuredly  they  are  in  the 
other;  the  owls  and  the  bats  have  been  permitted  to  dwell 
in  both  ;  and  at  the  porch  the  long  rank  grass  has  testified 
that  the  paths  of  entrance  are  no  longer  thronged  by  daily 
worshippers." 

Lew  Trenchard  church  had  a  magnificent  carved  screen,  and 
was  seated  throughout  with  richly  carved  oak  benches.  Condy, 
the  artist,  had  made  a  water-colour  drawing  of  the  interior 
when  in  this  condition. 

In  1833  my  grandfather  presented  to  the  living  his  youngest 
son,  Charles,  then  in  deacon's  orders  only.  And,  so  as  to  make 
the  church  look  trim  for  the  incumbency  of  his  son,  he  swept 
away  screen  and  benches  and  reseated  the  entire  church  with 
deal,  pews,  painted  drab,  and  all  with  doors.  The  linings  of 
the  family  and  the  parsonage  pews,  the  altar-cloth,  the  pulpit 
hangings  were  of  blue  fringed  with  yellow — the  family  colours, 
and  even  the  carved  bosses  of  the  wagon  roof  were  painted  blue 
and  yellow.  There  being  no  vestry,  the  surplice  was  hung  over 
the  altar  rails,  and  my  uncle  robed  there.  No  cassock  was  worn, 
only  a  very  full  surplice  with  high  collar  upstanding  and  reaching 
above  the  ears.  On  "  Sacrament  Sunday,"  since  1834  monthly, 
a  black  bottle  with  chalice  and  paten  stood  in  the  midst  on  the 
Lord's  Table,  covered  by  a  piece  of  white  linen.  There  was  a 
gallery  at  the  west  end,  with  a  barrel-organ  in  it,  that  played 


136 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


a  limited  number  of  times.  The  clerk  would  give  out  a  psalm, 
and  then  successively  two  lines  of  the  psalm,  which  thereupon 
the  people  sang.  As  there  were  few  in  the  congregation  who 
could  read,  this  was  necessary. 

A  certain  number  of  the  clergy  were  more  like  petty  squires 
than  priests.  Thackeray's  portrait  of  the  Rev.  Bute  Crawley  is 
not  in  the  least  overdrawn.  I  have  known  several  of  this  breed. 
One  was  master  of  the  Harriers,  dressed  like  a  jockey,  wore  a 
check  belcher,  was  credited  with  a  rough  tongue — but  I  myself 
never  heard  him  send  forth  a  volley  of  oaths.  I  have  seen  him 
capering  like  a  frog  at  a  county  ball,  and  getting  unduly  ex- 
hilarated with  champagne  at  the  supper.  Sydney  Smith  thus 
summed  up  the  first  charge  of  Blomfield,  Bishop  of  Chester, 
in  1825. 

Hunt  not,  fish  not,  shoot  not, 

Dance  not,  fiddle  not,  flute  not. 

But  before  all  things  it  is  my  particular  desire, 

That  once  at  least  in  every  week  you  take 

Your  dinner  with  the  Squire. 

There  was  one  advantage  in  the  parsons'  hunting  and  dining 
out,  and  that  was  that  they  did  exercise  some  sort  of  check 
on  foul  and  blasphemous  language.  But  as  to  their  having  any 
spiritual  influence  in  their  parishes — there  was  none  of  that. 
As  a  rule  they  were  good  men,  lived  moral  lives,  drank  somewhat 
heavily,  fulfilled  their  duties  in  church  as  they  understood  them, 
and  in  visiting  the  sick — and  that  was  all. 

I  will  quote  here  a  South  Devon  song — only  three  stanzas 
from  it — to  show  that  a  kindly  feeling  existed  towards  the  hunting 
parson  among  his  parishioners  ;  and  for  the  sake  of  the  general 
reader  I  will  somewhat  modify  the  dialect. 

Passon  Endacott,  down  to  Thorn, 

Gudliest  chap  as  iver  was  born  : 

Preaches  Zundays,  an'  rides  the  rest, 

Does  his  ridin'  by  far  the  best  ! 

Passon  Endacott,  down  to  Thorn, 

Rides  straight,  lives  straight,  fresh  as  the  corn, 

Gudly  chap  as  you  iver  did  see 

Fourteen  stun',  and  he's  six  foot  three. 

He  follows  the  hounds,  he  does,  he  does, 

Over  the  hedges  and  through  the  fuzz  ; 

He  hates  but  two  things,  only  two — 

Barb'd  wire  fence,  and  a  zarman  new. 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES  137 


Passon  Endacott  preaches  short, 
Ten-minute  zarman's  just  his  zort, 
He  jig-jogs  round  the  covert  like, 
And  longs  to  hear  the  old  clock  strike  ; 
But,  bless  you,  we  don't  mind  at  all, 
Us  reads  the  'scriptions  on  the  wall  ; 
There  bain't  no  soul  as  do  not  pray 
For  Passon  Endacott  down  Thorn  way. 

He  follows  the  hounds,  he  does,  he  does, 

Over  the  hedges  and  through  the  fuzz  ; 

There's  two  things  welcome  down  to  Thorn — 

A  chap  in  need,  an'  a  huntin'  horn. 

Passon  Endacott' s  good  to  know, 
Red-brick  face  and  a  head  of  snow  ; 
'Elps  us  all  with  zum  good  advice, 
Tho'  they  say  that  he  bain't  too  wise. 
But  us  do  know  him  well,  surely, 
The  biggest  heart  beneath  the  sky  ; 
An'  when  Death  calls,  an'  we'm  to  pay, 
Best  to  have  gone  old  Passon' s  way. 

He  follows  the  hounds,  he  does,  he  does, 

Over  the  hedges  and  through  the  fuzz  ; 

He  missed  but  one  thing  all  his  life — 

'Adn't  the  sense  for  to  get  a  wife. 

As  to  the  ordinary  country  parson,  his  sermons  were  sadly 
uninteresting,  and  in  no  way  appealed  to  the  feelings  or  the 
imagination  of  his  hearers.  I  shall  have  more  to  say  about  them 
in  another  chapter.  Here  I  will  only  quote  some  lines  on  a 
Lincolnshire  parish  priest,  written  about  1850  : 

Unhappy  pastor  of  the  fens, 

Who  Lincolnshire's  dull  peasants  pens, 

Worse  than  Boeotian  is  thy  fate, 

A  soul-and-body-damping  state. 

Damp  is  the  meadow's  wide  expanse, 

Damp  is  the  garden,  damp  the  manse, 

Damp  are  the  church,  the  walls,  the  books, 

And  damp  the  congregation's  looks  ; 

Damp  too  the  surplice,  sooth  to  say, 

On  solemn  Confirmation  day. 

Yet  sometimes  thou  the  horrid  thrall  may'st  fly  : 

Thy  sermons,  friend,  they  only  will  be  dry. 

The  bishops,  especially  such  as  had  been  nominated  by  Lords 
Shaftesbury  and  Palmerston,  had  very  little,  if  they  had  any, 
sense  of  humour. 

I  remember  the  case  of  the  consecration  of  a  church  in  the 
North,  where  a  procession  was  formed  of  the  choir  and  clergy 


138 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


in  surplices,  closing  with  the  bishop,  all  but  the  last  singing 
the  Urbs  Beata.  Rain  began  to  fall,  whereupon  Dr.  Proudie 
spread  his  gingham  umbrella,  beckoned  to  his  wife  to  hook  on 
to  his  arm,  and  the  two  trotted  behind  the  chanting  choir — and 
to  the  old  Gregorian  melody  too  ! — into  church,  Darby  and  Joan, 
under  the  wide-spreading  parapluie.  Mrs.  Proudie  had  that 
day  put  on  for  the  first  time  a  shot  silk  gown — that  at  all  costs 
must  not  be  wetted. 

A  somewhat  similar  case  came  under  my  notice  at  Lindhurst 
in  Sussex,  where  the  Bishop  of  Chichester  was  to  hold  a  con- 
firmation. A  procession  was  formed.  First  went  the  banner, 
followed  by  the  choir,  then  the  catechumens,  next  surpliced 
curates,  after  them  the  incumbent,  and  finally  the  Bishop  and 
Mrs.  Gilbert  in  a  cab  slowly  proceeding  as  the  procession  wound 
its  way  singing  a  psalm.  The  cabby  let  down  the  steps  between 
the  verses,  and  the  Bishop  gracefully  handed  out  his  wife  at  the 
Gloria.  The  curious  thing  in  this  case  was  that  the  Bishop  was 
a  man  of  great  personal  dignity,  but — they  had  no  notion  how 
to  do  things  in  those  days.    They  know  better  now. 

At  Hurst pierpoint,  till  the  present  stately  chapel  was  built, 
service  was  performed  in  the  undercroft  of  the  hall ;  and  for 
a  chancel  a  small  brick  apse  had  been  thrown  out  to  contain 
the  altar  and  form  the  sanctuary.  On  a  certain  occasion  three 
bishops  were  at  Hurst,  and  were  accommodated  in  the  sacrarium. 
By  an  unfortunate  oversight  no  kneeling  desks  had  been  pro- 
vided for  them  ;  accordingly  at  the  prayers  they  revolved  on 
their  heels,  went  down  on  their  knees  and  plunged  their  faces 
in  the  cushions  of  their  chairs,  thereby  presenting  to  the  school 
and  congregation  a  sight  of  three  white  and  black  globular 
masses,  one  rising  above  the  other.  No  heads  and  upper  portions 
of  the  body  were  visible,  only  these  rotundities  in  white  lawn 
and  black  satin. 

If  Bishop  Bickersteth  of  Exeter  had  possessed  the  smallest 
grain  of  humour,  it  would  have  saved  him  from  giving  the 
archdeaconry  of  Totnes  to  the  late  Vicar  of  S.  Andrews',  Ply- 
mouth, as  a  wedding  present,  when  the  aged  gentleman  married 
a  second  wife.  Nor  can  Bishop  Baring  have  had  a  spark  of  it 
in  him,  or  he  would  not  have  attempted  to  introduce  Mrs.  Baring 
into  the  throne,  to  sit  beside  him.  Only  the  remonstrance  of 
the  Dean  made  him  abandon  the  introduction. 

The  clergy  were  in  many  cases  quite  as  ignorant  of  "  how  to 
do  things  "  as  were  the  bishops,  and  processions  were  a  comical 


THE  CHURCH  IN  COUNTRY  PLACES  139 

sight  in  those  days.  Some  wore  short  surplices  and  a  great 
deal  of  stalking  leg  showing  below.  But  it  was  especially  in 
the  headgear  that  they  varied  most.  Certain  old  fellows  wore 
"  chimneypot  "  hats,  some  college  "  mortarboards,"  some 
clerical  "  wideawakes,"  and  a  few  birettas  ;  some  were  in  white 
socks  and  shoes,  others  in  boots  with  elastic  sides.  Moreover, 
in  processions  it  was  quite  impossible  to  make  the  old-fashioned 
parsons  refrain  from  talking  to  one  another.  Whilst  the  choir 
was  thundering  forth  "  O  how  amiable  are  thy  dwellings,  Thou 
Lord  of  hosts  :  my  soul  hath  a  desire  and  longing  to  enter  into 
the  courts  of  the  Lord  " — one  heard  behind  one  in  low  tones  : 
"  How  is  Mrs.  Good  ?  "  "  Middling,  thanks.  You  know  she's 
had  an  attack  of  shingles."  "  Very  unpleasant.  I  had  them 
once — but  they  are  not  dangerous."  "  Not  so  long  as  they  do 
not  meet  round  the  body  " — and  then  the  choir  :  "  Blessed  are 
they  that  dwell  in  Thy  house  ;  they  will  be  always  praising 
Thee." 

Bishops  and  clergy  alike  persisted  in  going  up  to  the  north 
end  of  the  Holy  Table,  like  Chevy  Slyme  in  Martin  Chuzzlewit, 
"  always  round  the  corner,  sir  !  "  It  was  quite  usual  to  see 
two  dignitaries,  or  a  rector  and  curate,  hobnobbing  to  each  other 
from  opposite  sides  of  the  altar.  But  the  most  ludicrous  effect 
was  produced  when  these  two  were  bishops.  I  saw  the  late 
Bishop  of  S.  Albans  (Claughton)  and  his  suffragan  of  Colchester 
at  a  visitation.  Each  was  at  an  end,  and  each  had  been  pro- 
vided with  high  stool  or  hassock,  so  they  both  projected  forward 
leaning  their  elbows  on  the  mensa,  and  as  their  arms  were  encased 
in  balloon  sleeves,  the  effect  was  most  grotesque,  as  though 
four  gigantic  puffballs  had  been  placed  on  the  altar.  Bishops 
nowadays  have  somewhat  reduced  the  exuberance  of  their  sleeves, 
but  I  doubt  if  they  have  a  full  idea  of  the  comical  appearance 
they  present  viewed  from  behind,  in  "  magpie." 


CHAPTER  VI 


THE  CHURCH  IN  TOWNS 

HITHERTO  I  have  spoken  of  villages  and  country 
parishes.  Something  must  now  be  said  about  the 
Church  in  towns.  The  squalor  that  prevailed  in 
village  churches  did  not  exist  in  such  as  were  in 
towns,  for  there  the  pews  were  appropriated  and  let,  and  it 
was  to  the  interest  of  the  parson  to  see  that  the  sacred  building 
was  kept  clean  and  well  warmed  ;  and  that  pulpit  and  reading- 
desk,  if  not  the  altar,  should  be  of  handsome  material  and  be 
well  cushioned.  The  pews  were  often  let  by  auction.  The 
congregation  was  one  of  listeners,  not  of  worshippers.  Occa- 
sionally a  lady  knelt.  The  men  sat  cross-legged.  On  entering 
the  pew,  a  gentleman  would  cover  his  face  by  peering  into  his 
hat,  he  standing.  "  Mother,"  said  I  when  a  child,  "  why  does 
my  dad  smell  his  hat  when  he  comes  into  church  ?  "  "Hush, 
my  dear!  he  is  addressing  his  Maker."  "But,  mamma,  it  is 
the  maker  of  the  hat  whose  name  is  in  the  crown." 

In  the  year  1824  a  million  was  granted  by  Parliament  for  the 
building  of  churches  ;  and  churches  were  erected  at  a  wasteful 
expenditure.  They  were  invariably  hideous  erections :  All 
Souls',  Langham  Place,  by  Nash ;  S.  Pancras,  with  its  caryatides, 
copied  from  the  Erechtheum  at  Athens.  Some  were  in  pseudo- 
Gothic  style — gaunt  halls,  lighted  by  meagre  imitation  Perpen- 
dicular windows,  without  internal  arcades.  Mr.  F.  E.  Paget 
in  one  of  his  novels  struck  a  blow  at  these  churches  designed 
by  Mr.  Compo  that  entirely  discredited  them.  They  were 
without  chancels,  but  furnished  with  an  alcove  in  which  stood  a 
table  draped  in  crimson  velvet,  with  a  chair  and  a  kneeling- 
stool  at  each  end. 

The  pews  were  all  appropriated,  except  a  few  bare  benches 
at  the  end  for  the  poor.  A  stranger  entering  a  church  looked 
about  till  he  caught  the  eye  of  the  pew-opener,  who  found  for 

140 


THE  CHURCH  IN  TOWNS 


141 


him  a  seat  in  one  of  the  deal  boxes,  and  received  a  sixpence  or 
shilling  as  a  gratuity  for  so  doing.  A  condition  of  the  hand 
in  which  the  fingers  were  permanently  flexed,  though  not  quite 
closed,  was  known  as  "  pew-opener's  rheumatism." 

There  were  in  London,  in  addition  to  the  parish  churches, 
numerous  licensed  proprietary  chapels,  un consecrated  for  the 
most  part,  started  for  popular  preachers,  and  run  as  money 
speculations — such  as  that  of  Charles  Honeyman,  described  by 
Thackeray,  concerning  which  more  presently. 

There  was  occasionally  a  tumbler  of  water  placed  on  the 
pulpit  ledge,  to  enable  the  orator  to  refresh  himself  when  getting 
hoarse.  Deaf  persons  were  provided  with  tubes  connected  with 
a  voice-receiver  beside  the  pulpit  cushion,  so  as  to  enable  them 
to  hear  distinctly.  I  remember  a  case  in  which  an  old  lady  who 
was  hard  of  hearing  held  the  end  of  this  apparatus  to  her  ear. 
The  preacher  accidentally  upset  the  tumbler  with  all  its  contents 
into  the  receiver,  with  the  result  that  a  jet  d'eau  played  into  the 
ear  and  over  the  face  of  the  lady. 

McNeile  was  credited  with  having  a  contrivance  in  his  pulpit 
at  S.  Paul's,  Liverpool,  for  sitting  upon  or  against,  so  adjusted 
with  springs  and  cranks  as  to  enable  him  when  preaching  to 
fling  himself  forward  and  from  side  to  side  without  effort. 
But  I  never  saw  that. 

One  of  the  most  startling  results  of  the  importance  attached 
to  the  sermon  in  the  minds  of  Church-people  was  the  arrange- 
ment in  a  Northern  church  of  a  movable  platform  within  the 
pulpit,  which  could  be  regulated  to  accommodate  the  propor- 
tions of  any  preacher  by  means  of  a  mechanical  contrivance 
worked  by  the  clerk  at  the  foot  of  the  stairs.  This  functionary, 
after  he  had  raised  the  preacher  to  what  he  decreed  was  the 
proper  height,  was  wont  to  walk  into  the  body  of  the  church  and 
take  an  observation  as  to  how  high  or  how  low  the  preacher 
stood  as  regarded  the  cushion,  and  he  could  always  rectify  any 
fault  in  his  previous  judgment  by  turning  a  handle  at  the  base 
of  the  pulpit,  so  as  to  raise  or  depress  the  platform  on  which 
stood  the  minister  in  black.  The  late  Archbishop  Longley  was 
wont  to  say  that  his  gravity  was  never  so  nearly  upset  in 
church  as  when,  on  one  of  these  occasions,  the  clerk  looked 
up  and  said,  "  I  think  you'll  do  now,  sir."  Nor  must  the 
Commandments  be  forgotten,  inscribed  above  the  Lord's  Table. 
As  to  the  windows,  cut  in  half  by  the  galleries,  they  sometimes 
contained  coloured  glass  in  the  traceries,  of  the  most  glaring 


142 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


and  offensive  crudeness  ;  and  below,  to  prevent  the  congregation 
from  looking  out  at  what  was  passing  in  the  street,  or  catching 
a  glimpse  of  blue  sky  and  flying,  fleecy  clouds,  the  white  glass 
was  ground. 

The  pews  were  so  ranged  as  to  command  the  pulpit ;  where, 
as  was  sometimes  the  case,  the  pulpit  and  reading-desk  were 
half-way  down  the  church,  all  occupants  of  the  pews  to  the  East 
sat  with  their  backs  to  the  altar. 

A  very  good  idea  of  what  the  arrangements  were  in  London 
churches  in  the  Early  Victorian  period  may  be  gained  by 
looking  at  Hogarth's  pictures  of  the  Industrious  Apprentice 
at  Church,  and  of  Religious  Fanaticism.  There  was  nothing 
altered. 

I  remember  when  a  small  boy  in  London  going  on  Sundays 
to — I  think  it  was  S.  Mary-le-Strand.  There  were  ranges  of 
galleries  there  one  above  another,  divided  off  as  boxes  in  a  theatre. 
During  the  sermon  I  was  wont  to  look  up  at  these,  and  imagine 
them  to  be  cages  in  a  menagerie,  and  while  away  the  tedious 
hour  by  fancying  them  occupied  by  tigers,  apes,  and  laughing 
hyenas.  Usually  in  front  of  the  west  gallery,  that  contained 
the  organ  and  the  singers,  was  a  board  on  which  were  inscribed 
the  names  of  the  churchwardens  when  the  interiors  of  these 
churches  were  renovated. 

David  Copperfield's  experiences  in  church  were  much  the  same 
as  mine  :  "  Here  is  our  pew  in  the  church.  What  a  high-backed 
pew  !  With  a  window  near  it,  out  of  which  our  house  can  be 
seen,  and  is  seen  many  times  during  the  morning's  service,  by 
Peggotty,  who  likes  to  make  herself  as  sure  as  she  can  that  it's 
not  being  robbed,  or  is  not  in  flames.  But  though  Peggotty 's 
eye  wanders,  she  is  much  offended  if  mine  does,  and  frowns  to 
me,  as  I  stand  upon  the  seat,  that  I  am  to  look  at  the  clergyman. 
But  I  can't  always  look  at  him — I  know  him  without  that  white 
thing  on,  and  I  am  afraid  of  his  wondering  why  I  stare  so,  and 
perhaps  stopping  the  service  to  inquire — and  what  am  I  to  do  ? 
It's  a  dreadful  thing  to  gape,  but  I  must  do  something.  I  look 
at  a  boy  in  the  aisle,  and  he  makes  faces  at  me.  ...  I  look  up 
at  the  monumental  tablets  on  the  wall,  and  try  to  think  of  Mr. 
Bodgers,  late  of  this  parish,  and  what  the  feelings  of  Mrs.  Bodgers 
must  have  been,  when  affliction  sore,  long  time  Mr.  Bodgers  bore, 
and  physicians  were  in  vain.  I  wonder  whether  they  called  in 
Mr.  Chillip,  and  he  was  in  vain  ;  and  if  so,  how  he  likes  to  be 
reminded  of  it  once  a  week.     I  look  from  Mr.  Chillip,  in  his 


THE  CHURCH  IX  TOWNS 


14.3 


Sunday  neckcloth,  to  the  pulpit ;  and  think  what  a  good  place 
it  would  be  to  play  in,  and  what  a  castle  it  would  make,  with 
another  boy  coming  up  the  stairs  to  attack  it,  and  having 
the  velvet  cushion  with  the  tassels  thrown  down  on  his  head. 
In  time  my  eyes  gradually  shut  up  ;  and  from  seeming  to  hear 
the  clergyman  singing  a  drowsy  song  in  the  heat,  I  hear  nothing, 
until  I  fall  off  the  seat  with  a  crash,  and  am  taken  out,  more 
dead  than  alive,  by  Peggotty." 

Dr.  Stoughton  has  given  a  graphic  account  of  the  proprietary 
chapels  built  in  London  during  the  latter  half  of  the  eighteenth 
century.  M  Their  architectural  appearance  did  not  invite 
strangers  to  enter,  and  the  interior,  if  not  a  hindrance,  certainly 
was  no  help  to  devotion.  Built  with  plain  brick  walls,  shapeless 
windows,  ugly  roofs  and  tasteless  entrances,  they  presented  inside 
deep  galleries,  tall  pews,  and  a  wide  aisle  in  the  middle,  blocked 
up  by  rows  of  uncomfortable  benches  for  the  poor.  There 
stood  a  pulpit  with  a  huge  sounding-board,  just  in  front  of  the 
Communion-table,  hiding  the  Lord's  Prayer,  the  Belief  and  the 
Ten  Commandments.  It  rose  pagoda-like  in  distinct  stories — 
three  desks,  one  for  the  clerk,  one  for  the  reader,  and  one  for 
the  preacher.  Immense  brass  chandeliers  studded  with  candles 
hung  down  from  the  ceiling,  and  the  upholstery  of  the  place  was 
most  abundant.  The  preacher  leaned  over  a  superb  cushion, 
under  which  were  violet  hangings,  fringed  with  gold  and  the 
letters  I.H.S.  The  hearers  sat  in  green -lined  boxes,  on  well- 
stuffed  seats,  with  a  vast  apparatus  of  hassocks.  Select  corners 
were  separated  from  other  parts  by  heavy  curtains,  where  the 
privileged  could  worship  unobserved.  These  chapels  in  fashion- 
able quarters  were  frequented  by  the  rich  and  the  respectable. 
Carriages,  with  stylishly-dressed  ladies  and  gentlemen,  attended 
by  servants  in  livery,  swept  up  proudly  to  the  door  ;  and  people 
attracted  by  a  popular  preacher,  but  not  entitled  to  sittings  in  the 
edifice,  had  to  fee  a  beadle  or  a  female  pew-opener."  1 

The  following  curious  account  of  London  churches  occurs  in  a 
book  published  in  Leipzig  in  1834,  entitled  Bilder  ans  London, 
giving  pictures  of  London  life  at  that  time,  by  Otto  von  Rosen- 
berg, illustrated  by  his  own  pencil.  I  extract  the  chapter  on 
Religion  along  with  his  notes  : 

"The  rage,  now  prevalent  in  England,  to  attend  church  as 
often  as  possible  during  the  day,  in  order  to  obtain  the  appear- 

1  Stoughton  (J.),  Religion  in  England  under  Queen  Anne  and  the  Georges, 
ii.  103.    London,  1878. 


144 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


ance  and  the  reputation  of  a  God-fearing  man,  has  now  reached 
its  highest  point.1 

"  Formerly  it  was  considered  sufficient  to  attend  divine 
service  on  Sunday  morning  and  afternoon,  but  now  as  well  there 
are  prayer- meetings  almost  daily  during  the  week,  that  last  from 
three  to  four  hours.  These  ecclesiastical  assemblies  serve  rather 
the  purpose  of  inaugurating  intrigues,  of  showing  off  new  dresses  ; 
and  I  may  remark  in  parenthesis,  that  the  vanity  of  English 
gentlemen  far  surpasses  that  of  the  French.  If  one  enters  a 
gentleman's  dressing-room  when  he  is  preparing  to  go  to  church, 
one  sees  pomatum,  oils,  scents,  curling-papers,  whisker-brushes 
— in  a  word,  everything  that  can  make  a  man  effeminate.  How 
little  such  a  petit-mattre  get-up  suits  an  Englishman,  whose 
characteristics  gleam  out  through  his  borrowed  French  get-up, 
is  indescribable. 

"  In  England  every  one  preaches.  The  shoemaker  casts  aside 
his  last,  stands  like  John  the  Baptist  in  the  open  under  a  tree 
and  preaches  ;  his  apprentice  serves  as  his  precentor.  Hundreds 
of  folk  assemble  to  hear  this  marvel,  and  hundreds  take  a  delight 
in  this  nonsense.  Quite  considerable  sums  are  collected,  as 
free-will  offerings,  so  as  to  build  him  a  chapel.  The  honourable 
cobbler  is  now  installed  as  preacher,  and  prays  as  long  and  as 
loud  as  he  chooses. 

"When  business  fails,  a  fellow  becomes  a  sectarian,  and 
drives  a  roaring  business,  for  it  is  easy  enough  to  find  an  audience 
of  pious  or  stupid  persons.  In  Lostwithiel  in  Cornwall  recently 
a  dyer  named  Pleymer  was  brought  up  before  the  court.  He 
had  received  a  call,  he  protested,  to  labour  for  the  salvation  of 
men's  souls  and  to  preach  of  heavenly  joys  on  earth,  and  for 
this  he  abandoned  his  shop,  his  wife  and  children.  He  spoke 
most  unctuously  in  his  meetings,  as  also  before  the  jury;  and 
his  words  were  listened  to  with  admiration  by  his  adherents, 
but  by  unprejudiced  persons  were  considered  to  be  partly  stupid 
stuff  and  partly  impudence.  As,  however,  witnesses  established 
that  he  had  seduced  eight  girls  and  married  women,  and  by  all 
sorts  of  roguery  had  extorted  money  from  them,  he  was  pro- 
nounced '  Guilty  '  and  was  sentenced  to  seek  the  salvation  of 
his  soul  and  community  of  joys  in  a  convict  settlement. 

"  Half  an  hour  before  the  beginning  of  divine  service,  the 

1  "  I  have  known  many  highly  educated  families  that  regard  it  as  a 
sin  to  speak  on  a  Sunday  on  anything  but  religious  matters.  And  on 
this  day  the  Bible  was  never  out  of  their  hands." 


THE  CHURCH  IN  TOWNS 


145 


poor  children  are  assembled,  who  are  brought  up  in  an  estab- 
lishment for  the  purpose  in  every  parish,  where  they  are  also 
clothed.  In  these  are  often  as  many  as  forty  or  fifty  girls  and  as 
many  boys  ;  and  these  strut  from  the  schoolhouse  two  and  two, 
with  the  beadle  at  their  head,  and  attended  by  their  teachers, 
male  and  female.  In  the  church  they  are  separated  to  join  the 
choirs  and  sing  the  psalms  during  the  service  and  after  the 
sermon.  The  noblest  lady  could  not  be  neater  nor  more  cleanly 
dressed  than  are  these  girls.  They  wear  a  simple  white  cap, 
some  tied  with  blue,  others  with  red  ribbons ;  the  cap  covers 
only  a  portion  of  their  hair  cut  short  across  the  brow.  The 
frock  is  coloured  according  to  the  portion  of  the  town  to  which 
they  pertain — a  brown,  blue,  green  material,  short  in  the  sleeve, 
with  white  cuffs  a  hand's-breadth  turned  back.  The  throat  is 
enclosed  within  a  snow-white  kerchief,  as  clean  as  are  the  white 
aprons.  Every  child  has  on  the  arm  a  number  which  is  engraved 
on  an  oval  tin  scutcheon  of  the  size  of  a  dollar.  The  girl  who  has 
distinguished  herself  by  her  good  conduct  and  intelligence  acts 
as  a  sort  of  monitress  over  a  certain  number  of  her  companions, 
and  has,  hung  about  her  throat,  a  silver  medal.  The  boys  carry 
their  numbers,  after  the  fashion  of  lower  Prussian  officials,  on 
their  chests.  The  dress  of  these  boys  is  ridiculous  in  the  extreme. 
A  cap  of  coarse  wool,  with  a  badge  of  orange,  the  tails  of  which 
flutter  in  the  wind,  hardly  covers  the  top  of  the  head.  A  linen 
string  to  which  clerical  bands  are  attached  is  fastened  round 
the  throat.  The  coat,  which  is  coloured  according  to  the  district, 
has  the  shape  of  a  short  great-coat,  from  which  a  piece  in  the 
form  of  a  skittle  has  been  cut  away  below.  Yellow  leather, 
tight-fitting,  short  knee-breeches  with  buckles,  do  not  help  to 
make  these  youths  more  presentable.  In  order  to  complete 
their  old-fashioned  costumes,  they  wear  blue  or  black  woollen 
stockings  and  buckled  shoes. 

"  On  the  way  to  church  each  boy  is  required  to  have  his 
hands  turned  behind  his  back  and  to  carry  his  psalm-book  under 
his  arm,  and  march  in  profound  gravity.  The  girls  carry  their 
hands  folded  below  the  breast,  also  with  the  prayer-book  under 
their  arms.  In  summer,  when  it  does  not  rain,  or  when  the  sun 
is  over-hot,  they  carry  their  round  straw  hats  hung  over  the 
arm.  In  rainy  weather  they  have  grey  cloaks  provided  with 
hoods,  that  reach  below  the  knee. 

"  The  church  officials  wear  a  very  remarkable  costume. 
The  three-cornered  hat  is  decorated  with  a  broad  gold  edging. 

IO 


146 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


The  cloak,  which  hangs  like  a  sack  over  their  shoulders,  has 
a  collar  richly  adorned,  as  also  the  sleeves,  with  gold  lace.  In 
their  hands  they  carry  a  long  round  rod,  with  the  tower  of  the 
church  to  which  they  pertain  surmounting  it  in  silver.  Every 
church  has  two  such  functionaries,  who  stand  at  the  entrance, 
who  conduct  the  preacher  from  the  sacristy  to  the  pulpit  and 
back  again,  and  open  the  pews  to  the  privileged  persons  of  the 
parish. 

"  The  interior  of  an  English  church  is  very  simple  and  pleasing. 
In  some  the  pulpit  stands  in  the  middle  and  has  connected  with 
it  two  subsidiary  structures,  of  which  one  is  much  lower  than 
the  other.  The  loftiest  of  all  is  reserved  for  the  preacher ;  the 
second,  which  is  from  two  to  three  feet  lower,  for  the  clergyman 
who  reads  the  proper  lessons  from  the  Old  and  New  Testament, 
appointed  for  the  Sunday.  The  third  is  for  the  clerk,  who  has 
to  pronounce  the  Amen  that  concludes  every  prayer  and  to  give 
out  the  psalms  that  have  been  selected  by  the  clergyman  to  be 
sung. 

"  Most  pulpits  are  of  massive  mahogany.  One  great  misfor- 
tune about  this  arrangement  is  that,  when  erected  in  the  middle 
of  God's  House,  it  shuts  off  the  great  majority  of  the  congrega- 
tion either  wholly  or  partially  from  the  altar;  and  in  large  churches 
they  cannot  hear,  for  the  great  pulpit  standing  before  the  altar 
throws  back  the  sound,  when  the  officiant  is  there,  before  it  can 
reach  the  congregation. 

"  The  famous  Scotchman  Irving  came,  like  so  many  others, 
to  London,  to  make  money,  and  arrived  without  shoes  or  stock- 
ings. By  giving  lessons  he  succeeded  in  a  short  time  in  earning 
enough  to  hire  a  roomy  building,  which  he  called  the  Scottish 
Meeting-house,  and  there  he  began  to  give  his  religious  medita- 
tions. Presently  he  obtained  so  great  a  renown  as  a  famous 
preacher,  that  people  stood  by  hundreds  before  the  door,  if 
only  to  see  him.  Then,  under  the  plea  of  serving  for  a  charity, 
he  charged  a  shilling  for  admission,1  nevertheless  his  meeting- 
house was  packed  from  top  to  bottom.  Then  the  Scottish 
community  contributed  huge  sums  to  erect  a  Scottish  church 
in  the  Gothic  style,  and  this  was  completed  some  four  or  five 
years  ago.  Here  Irving  carried  on  night  and  day,  and  thundered 
his  prophecies,  of  which  only  one  has  clung  to  my  memory : 

1  "  In  the  Foundling  Hospital  every  one  who  attends  service,  where 
the  singing  is  good,  and  which,  oddly  enough,  is  led  by  actors  and  actresses 
— pays  a  shilling  entrance-fee." 


IRVING  PRKACHIXi; 


THE  CHURCH  IN  TOWNS 


147 


'  The  world  will  not  perish  by  fire,  but  by  water.  In  this  general 
flood  England  alone,  God-fearing  enlightened  land  that  it  is,  will 
remain  intact,  and  will  see  the  revival  of  the  days  of  Eden.' 

"As  to  Irving's  personal  appearance,  he  is  well  formed,  very 
tall  and  strong,  carries  thick  black  hair  that  hangs  down  to 
his  shoulders,  and  he  squints  badly  with  his  left  eye.  In  bad 
or  cold  weather  he  wears  a  long  black  mantle,  dresses  in  black 
knee-breeches  and  silk  stockings  of  the  same  colour.  I  never 
saw  an  ecclesiastic  who  looked  more  like  a  bandit.  As  the 
expression  of  the  above-mentioned  lefteye  is  positively  diabolical, 
all  the  pews  on  the  right  side  of  the  preacher  are  paid  for  at  a 
higher  rate  than  on  the  left. 

"  Whilst  the  introductory  prayer  is  being  put  up,  and  which 
at  times  lasts  longer  than  an  hour,  the  doorkeepers  are  for- 
bidden to  admit  the  late  comers,  who  are  often  to  be  reckoned 
by  hundreds,  and  have  to  wait  in  the  vestibule.  Only  when  the 
Amen  has  been  uttered  are  the  doors  opened,  and  the  tramp  of 
the  incoming  crowd  is  like  the  roar  of  Niagara. 

"  Several  times  he  has  rebuked  late  arrivals  with  vehemence, 
exclaiming,  '  Why  do  you  come  so  late  ?  '  Whereupon  one 
replied,  '  What  is  that  to  you,  Sir  ?  '  Moreover  he  gesticulates, 
in  my  opinion,  too  greatly,  and  his  hands,  often  stretched  to 
heaven  above  his  head,  touch  the  sounding-board  ;  and  his 
gigantic  size  has  in  it  something  strange  and  terrifying." 

Irving  was  the  inventor  of  the  sect  that  absurdly  arrogated 
to  itself  the  title  of  the  Catholic- Apostolic  Church.  It  possesses 
about  eighty  conventicles  in  England,  and  originated  in  the 
unintelligible  j  abbe  rings  of  some  hysterical  women,  that  were 
supposed  to  have  the  gift  of  tongues.  There  was  about  this 
period  a  general  craving  after  prophetic  utterances  or  after 
interpretations  of  the  Apocalypse.  One  who  ministered  to  this 
craving  and  made  money  out  of  it  was  Dr.  Cumming.  On  one 
occasion  he  announced  the  immediate  approach  of  the  great 
tribulation  of  the  Last  Day.  It  came  out  that  he  had  not  failed 
at  the  same  time  to  order  in  a  supply  of  coals  sufficient  for  six 
months.    Alfred  Ainger  wrote  of  him  : 

Dr.  Cumming,  the  eminent  low-church  divine, 
Who  is  putting  us  up  to  a  proximate  sign, 
Now  tells  us,  without  any  ha'ing  and  hum'ing, 
What  a  final  and  grievous  affliction  is  coming. 

There  were  at  the  time  a  certain  number  of  clerical  adventurers 
of  the  type  of  Charles  Honeyman,  who  performed  in  proprietary 


148 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


chapels  ;  men  ready  to  have  florid  services  and  gush  in  the 
pulpit,  either  high — as  high  was  considered  in  their  days,  or  else 
low,  just  as  paid  best.  They  wore — it  was  the  correct  thing — 
lavender  kid  gloves  in  the  pulpit.  One  of  them  was  Higgins,  who 
changed  his  name  to  Montague  Bellew  ;  he  read  the  Command- 
ments so  effectively  as  to  bring  tears  into  the  eyes. 

Thackeray's  account  of  Charles  Honeyman  applied  to  this 
set.  "  Charles  Honeyman's  chapel  was  above  Sherrick's  wine 
vaults,  and  Sherrick  ran  the  chapel  as  he  ran  certain  theatres  ; 
and  Honeyman  did  his  best  for  his  employer  by  recommending 
his  wines." 

Here  is  the  Rev.  Charles  in  his  chapel :  "An  odour  of  mille- 
fleurs  rustled  by  them  as  Charles  Honeyman,  accompanied  by 
his  ecclesiastical  valet,  passed  the  pew  from  the  vestry,  and 
took  his  place  at  the  desk.  Formerly  he  used  to  wear  a  flaunting 
scarf  over  his  surplice,  which  was  very  wide  and  full;  and  Clive 
remembered  how  his  uncle  used  to  puff  out  the  scarf  and  the 
sleeves  of  his  vestment,  arrange  the  natty  curl  on  his  forehead, 
and  take  his  place,  a  fine  example  of  florid  church  decoration. 
Now  the  scarf  was  trimmed  down  to  be  as  narrow  as  your  neck- 
cloth, and  hung  loose  and  straight.  The  ephod  was  cut  straight 
and  as  close  and  short  as  might  be — I  believe  there  was  a  little 
trimming  of  lace  to  the  narrow  sleeves,  and  a  slight  arabesque 
of  tape  round  the  edge  of  the  surplice.  As  for  the  curl  on  the 
forehead,  it  was  no  more  visible  than  the  Maypole  in  the  Strand. 
Honeyman 's  hair  was  parted  down  the  middle,  short  in  front, 
and  curling  delicately  round  his  ears  and  the  back  of  his  head. 
He  read  the  service  in  a  swift  manner,  and  with  a  gentle  twang. 
In  the  sermon,  Charles  dropped  the  twang  with  the  surplice, 
and  the  priest  gave  way  to  the  preacher." 

The  portrait  is  not  overdrawn.  There  were  these  clerical 
cockscombs  in  the  first  half  of  the  Victorian  period — Thackeray 
struck  them  a  stunning  blow  in  his  description  of  Charles  Honey- 
man. But  these  men  did  not  belong  to  the  sincere  Church 
party,  or  to  that  of  the  earnest  Evangelicals.  They  were 
mountebanks  posturing  as  ministers  of  the  Gospel,  and  the 
proprietary  chapels  were  their  booths  and  stages.  Now  this 
type  of  man  has  disappeared.  There  may  still  be,  and  there 
are,  clerical  fops,  and  eloquent  preachers  of  vapid  sentiment,  but 
they  know  that  men  and  women  with  common  sense  despise 
them.  If  a  man  is  an  ass,  he  disguises  his  ears,  and  pretends  to 
abhor  thistles. 


THE  CHURCH  IN  TOWNS 


149 


The  dress  of  the  clergy  in  the  eighteenth  century  had  become 
gradually  more  and  more  secular  ;  at  last  it  consisted  in  black 
pantaloons  and  frock-coat,  a  white  tie  and  collars  standing 
up  on  each  side  of  the  chin — blinkers  they  were  termed.  But 
Newman  wore  a  long-tailed  evening  dress  coat,  and  this  generally 
became  the  badge  of  the  High-Church  clergy.  I  saw  Keble  thus 
accoutred  a  few  years  before  his  death,  and  it  must  be  admitted 
that  the  clergy  looked  very  much  like  waiters.  The  white  neck- 
cloth is  still  clung  to  assiduously  by  schoolmasters  and  Broad 
Churchmen. 

Although  fine  feathers  do  not  make  fine  birds,  the  plumage 
differentiates  the  kinds.  Moreover,  most  birds  have  their  winter 
as  well  as  their  summer  dress.  On  the  Continent  the  rustic 
can  always  be  distinguished  from  the  townsman  by  his  costume. 
In  Germany  the  Bauer  has  abandoned  knee-breeches  and  worsted 
stockings,  but  remains  recognizable  by  his  silver  buttons  and 
the  peculiar  cut  of  his  garments.  The  French  paysan  entertains 
no  thought  of  abandoning  his  serviceable  blouse.  Indeed,  the 
labour  members  of  the  National  Assembly  are  proud  to  appear 
in  that  distinguishing  garment.  Servant-maids  with  us  still  wear 
black  with  white  aprons  and  caps,  and  in  this  simple  livery  are 
far  more  attractive  than  in  their  Sunday  war-paint,  when  they 
try  to  look  like  ladies  and  fail  in  the  attempt.  Our  officers  at 
one  time  habitually  wore  uniform,  now  they  entertain  no  greater 
desire  than  to  appear  in  mufti.  It  is  hard  to  expect  Tommy 
Atkins  to  salute  his  superior  officer  habited  in  cricketing  flannels 
as  gravely  and  respectfully  as  when  he  blazes  in  full  regimentals. 
In  France  and  Germany  officers  as  well  as  privates  only  get  out 
of  their  uniform  to  get  into  bed. 

It  is  remarkable  that  among  the  clergy  there  should  have 
been  such  a  fluctuation  in  clerical  dress.  Before  the  decline 
already  mentioned,  every  priest  wore  a  short  cassock.  Now  this 
is  confined  to  the  bishops.  With  the  rise  of  Tractarianism  came 
in  long  Noah's  Ark  coats  and  the  black — vulgarly  called  "  M.B." 
(mark  of  the  Beast) — waistcoat,  the  discarding  of  ties  and  the 
wearing  of  a  stiff,  circular,  so-called  "  Jam-pot  "  clerical  collar. 
In  the  matter  of  cassocks  the  High-Church  clergy  copied  those 
worn  in  France,  buttoned  down  in  front,  whereas  the  Evan 
gelicals  adhered  to  what  was  flippantly  termed  "  Nursing  cas- 
socks/' with  one  button  at  the  shoulder.  But  the  clergy  who 
belonged  to  neither  party  wore  none  at  all,  and  as  the  surplices 
were  short,  there  was  a  great  display  of  leg  below.    The  type  of 


150 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


cassock  affected  by  the  Low- Church  clergy  is,  oddly  enough,  that 
of  the  Jesuits.  Of  recent  years  the  clergy,  like  peafowl,  have 
been  shedding  their  tails.  They  are  to  be  seen  in  very  short 
coats  exposing  the  seats  of  their  trousers.  But  this  is  largely 
due  to  the  use  of  the  bicycle.  On  the  other  hand  Dissenting 
ministers  have  adopted  the  discarded  clerical  coats  of  the  Puseyite 
parson.  Among  them  is  to  be  seen  stricter  clerical  costume  than 
among  the  clergy.  They  have  learned  that  dress  goes  a  long  way 
towards  inspiring  respect.  A  countryman  will  doff  his  cap  to  a 
curate  clerically  attired  who  will  pass  a  crop-tailed  rector  with 
a  lateral  jerk  of  the  chin. 

Bishop  Ellicott  once  had  up  an  incumbent  in  his  diocese 
to  rebuke  him  for  wearing  a  short  surplice.  "  Well,  my  Lord," 
he  replied,  "  Man  wants  but  little  here  below,  nor  wants  that 
little  long — and  I  may  say  the  same  with  regard  to  my  surplice." 

Our  modern  clergy  may  make  the  same  excuse  as  was  made 
for  the  short  surplice  when  they  wear  their  coats  cut  short  at 
the  termination  of  the  spine. 

David's  servants  were  thought  to  be  very  scandalously 
treated  when  Hanun  cut  their  garments  to  the  shortness  now 
adopted  by  our  clergy  (2  Sam.  x.  4).  They  resemble  the  three 
blind  mice  of  the  round. 

It  may  be  absurd  in  me,  but  I  respect  an  Anglican  bishop 
in  knee-breeches  and  apron  more  than  I  do.  one  from  America 
in  baggy  trousers.  A  beautiful  young  huntress  was  the  admira- 
tion of  the  field  in  her  bottle-green  tailor-made  habit  and  velvet 
cap.  Her  horse  took  a  hedge  of  thorns  and  fell  on  the  farther 
side.  The  gentlemen  were  dismounted  and  on  the  spot  at  once, 
but  could  see  nothing  of  the  lady.  The  only  objects  visible 
were  a  skirt  fluttering  in  the  hedge,  and  a  jackanapes  of  a  boy 
in  green  jacket  and  corduroys,  to  whom  they  administered  a 
kick,  and  an  injunction  as  a  "confounded  little  nipper"  to  get 
out  of  the  way  while  they  explored  the  ditch  for  the  missing 
beauty.  A  lovely  girl  in  habit  is  one  thing — without  her  skirt 
she  is  naught. 

A  book  has  on  its  cover  a  title  suitable  to  its  contents.  Why 
should  a  treatise  on  Pastoral  Theology  be  labelled  Roderick 
Random,  or  one  upon  "  The  Whole  Duty  of  Man  "  have  on  the 
back  Sports  and  Pastimes  of  the  English  ? 

There  are  conditions  of  life,  says  Dickens  in  Oliver  Twist,  that 
acquire  a  peculiar  value  and  dignity  from  the  coats  and  waist- 
coats connected  with  them.    "  A  Field-Marshal  has  his  uniform  ; 


THE  CHURCH  IN  TOWNS 


151 


a  Bishop  his  silk  apron  ;  a  councillor  his  silk  gown  ;  a  beadle  his 
hat  and  lace.  What  are  they  ?  Men — mere  men.  Dignity,  and 
even  holiness  too,  sometimes  are  more  questions  of  coat  and 
waistcoat  than  some  people  imagine."  A  difficulty  is  felt  in 
dealing  with  the  insane  to  prevent  them  from  tearing  off  their 
clothes,  and  although  it  would  be  going  too  far  to  consider 
it  madness  in  the  clergy  when  they  divest  themselves  of  their 
uniform,  it  is  indicative  of  indiscretion.  A  priest  should  bear 
the  cognizance  of  a  priest,  never  knowing  when  he  may  be 
needed.  Sterne  in  Tristram  Shandy  declares  that  the  outer  and 
the  inner  man  are  so  much  of  a  piece,  that  if  you  ruffle  the  one 
you  rumple  up  the  other.  So  much  of  a  piece  are  they  that  we 
cannot  but  suspect  that  the  secularizing  of  the  exterior  of  a 
priest  indicates  a  corresponding  secularization  within. 

It  was  presumably  due  to  the  mediocrities  who  entered  Orders, 
at  one  time  that  the  Church  was  supplied  with  feeblings  as  can- 
didates for  Orders.  Formerly  it  was  supposed  that  there  had 
been  a  Pope  Joan.  At  the  period  referred  to,  an  idea  must 
have  got  abroad  that  a  number  of  Betsy  Janes  had  surreptitiously 
entered  the  ministry ;  for  to  insist  on  their  masculine  character 
the  feeblest  curates  took  to  growing  moustaches,  then  peculiar 
to  the  military.  The  he-goats  complained  to  Jupiter  that  the 
Nannies  had  been  accorded  beards.  "  Suffer  them,"  replied 
the  god,  "  to  enjoy  their  empty  honours,  so  long  as  yours  is  the 
virility."  This  certainly  applied  at  one  time,  not  so  much  now: 
poor  effeminate, languid  creatures, without  force,  without  intellects 
could  only  show  the  public  that  they  were  not  females  in  cassocks 
by  a  scrubby  growth  on  the  upper  lip. 

The  sermons  of  the  period  were  for  the  most  part  deplorably 
uninteresting.  There  was  no  manner  of  doctrinal  teaching, 
no  building  up  in  the  Faith,  except  among  the  High-Church 
clergy.  The  vast  bulk  of  those  who  occupied  the  pulpits  were 
mildly  orthodox,  but  they  taught  nothing  ;  they  contented  them- 
selves with  moral  exhortations,  and  pressed  on  their  hearers 
lessons  these  latter  were  perfectly  able  to  draw  for  themselves, 
and  truths  they  had  never  doubted.  They  greatly  affected 
taking  as  their  text  a  passage  from  the  first  lesson  for  the  Sunday, 
and  we  had  to  endure  every  year  the  same  platitudes  on  "  Are 
not  Abana  and  Pharpar,  rivers  of  Damascus,  better  than  all 
the  waters  of  Israel  ?  "  or  "  Is  it  a  time  to  receive  money,  and 
to  receive  garments,"  etc.  ?  ;  or  Jehoiakim  cutting  the  roll  with 
his  penknife  and  throwing  it  into  the  fire  ;  or  Samuel's  lecture 


152 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


to  Saul,  "To  obey  is  better  than  sacrifice  ";  or  a  laboured  apology 
for  that  infamous  act  of  treachery  by  Jael  the  wife  of  Heber  ;  or 
from  the  New  Testament,  Felix  trembling. 

It  so  fell  out  that  I  had  heard  a  sermon  on  Felix  trembling 
at  Brighton  ;  next  Sunday  I  had  Felix  trembling  again  in  London. 
For  the  following  Sunday  I  was  staying  with  my  maternal  uncle, 
then  curate  in  North  Devon,  and  I  said  to  him,  "  For  pity's  sake 
do  not  let  us  have  Felix  trembling  on  Sunday  morning.''  I  had 
forgotten  all  about  this,  when  a  few  years  later  I  was  in  Exeter 
and  went  to  S.  David's  Church.  To  my  surprise  I  saw  coming 
up  the  nave,  to  be  escorted  to  the  pulpit,  my  uncle  in  cassock  and 
gown.  As  he  passed  my  pew  he  caught  my  eye  and  gave  a  little 
start.  He  afforded  us  a  very  good  sermon  on  Blind  Bartimseus. 
After  the  service  I  went  to  him  in  the  vestry,  whereupon  he  caught 
me  by  the  arm  and  said :  "  You  rascal,  you  might  have  seriously 
confused  me.  I  was  going  to  preach  on  Felix,  whom  I  had  trem- 
bling in  my  pocket,  but  on  seeing  you  I  recalled  what  you  said 
three  years  ago.  Happily  I  had  Blind  Bartimseus  in  the  other 
pocket,  and  Felix  must  remain  till  a  more  convenient  season." 

Whoever  now  looks  into  and  thinks  of  using  the  sermons 
printed  during  the  period  from  1800  to  1870  ? 

When  a  widow  leaves  a  parsonage  she  often  gives  the  tub 
containing  the  old  written  sermons  of  her  husband  to  his  suc- 
cessor ;  faithful,  loyal  soul,  thinking  that  his  old  parishioners 
would  relish  the  same  that  they  had  heard  before  so  often.  I 
do  not  suppose  that  they  would  have  recognized  any  of  them, 
because  none  would  contain  anything  calculated  to  lodge  in 
their  minds. 

When  I  was  in  Essex,  I  purposely  read  on  Sunday  morning  a 
sermon  by  one  who  became  a  bishop ;  it  was  from  one  of  a  series 
of  his  discourses  supposed  to  be  very  plain  and  very  profitable. 
On  a  certain  Sunday  by  mistake  I  preached  the  same  sermon 
I  had  employed  the  Sunday  before,  and  did  not  recognize  it  till 
I  came  to  the  end,  and  found  my  pencil  note  signifying  the  date 
on  which  it  had  been  preached.  I  was  distressed  and  spoke 
about  it  to  several  of  my  congregation.  Not  one  had  noticed 
the  fact.  My  reason  for  using  this  collection  was  that  I  deemed 
it  advisable  that  the  congregation  should  have  the  thoughts  of 
some  other  preacher  than  myself.  I  used  those  sermons — I  think 
they  were  in  three  series — for  three  years,  and  then  threw  them 
into  the  fire.  I  can  remember  the  subject  of  one  only  of  them — 
and  that  was  a  prose  version  and  moralizing  of  some  poem  ; 


THE  CHURCH  IN  TOWNS 


153 


for  it  was  the  only  one  of  those  150  sermons  that  contained  an 
idea — and  that  was  borrowed. 

A  certain  old-fashioned  parson  had  just  about  fifty-two 
sermons  written  and  kept  in  a  drawer,  one  for  each  Sunday  in 
the  year,  and  during  an  incumbency  of  over  twenty  years 
annually  preached  the  same  sermons.  In  one  of  them  was  an 
allusion  to  a  fox,  and  the  fox  was  ever  expected  to  put  in  its 
appearance  on  its  proper  Sunday.  But  on  a  particular  occasion 
the  parson  thought  to  disguise  the  identity  of  his  sermon  with 
that  of  previous  years  by  employing  the  term  "  a  crafty  quad- 
ruped "  in  place  of  the  name  of  the  beast.  As  he  and  the  con- 
gregation were  leaving  the  church,  the  old  warden  came  up  to 
him  and  said,  "  Eh,  but  Mr.  William,  where  be  the  fox  hiding 
to  now  ?  " 

At  Pau  in  the  Pyrenees,  at  the  English  chapel,  the  chaplain 
always  gave  the  identical  sequence  of  discourses.  In  one 
occurred  something  about  a  white  bird.  We  had  been  at  Pau 
for  the  winter  of  1847  and  returned  to  England  in  the  spring  of 
1848.  In  the  autumn  of  1849  we  wen"t  to  Pau  again.  I  betted 
with  my  brother  that  we  should  have  the  M  white  bird  "  again, 
and  the  bet  was  for  five  francs.  Sure  enough,  on  the  special 
Sunday  the  "  white  bird  "  again  fluttered.  "  Stump  up," 
said  I,  nudging  my  brother:  M  I  have  won  the  bet." 

Then  there  ensued  a  change  in  the  character  of  the  discourses. 
Some  preachers  sought  to  engage  the  attention  of  the  audience 
by  introduction  of  anecdotes.  Now  I  have  heard  some  of  these 
anecdotal  preachers,  and  they  have  so  stuffed  their  sermons 
with  stories  that  one  has  come  away  forgetting  what  they  were 
intended  to  emphasize.    One  anecdote  is  quite  enough. 

Sermons  are  nowadays  not  quite  so  colourless  as  of  old.  Still, 
more  teaching  is  needed,  and  less  of  commonplace  moralizing. 
They  are  too  long  in  the  morning.  When  Mr.  Weller  objected 
to  his  son's  love-letter  to  Mary  as  "  rayther  short,"  "  Not  a 
bit  of  it,"  answered  Sam.  "  She'll  wish  there  was  more,  and 
that's  the  great  art  o'  letter- writing."  It  is  equally  so  of  preach- 
ing. Does  it  ever  occur  to  English  clergy  that  one  main  reason 
why  so  few  men  attend  church  at  eleven  o'clock  on  Sunday  is  that 
they  do  not  wish  to  hear  a  sermon  ?  They  have  not  been  educated , 
like  the  Roman  Catholics,  to  attend  an  early  Eucharist,  and  then 
to  have  the  rest  of  the  day  for  motoring  along  the  roads  or 
sculling  on  the  river  ;  and  accordingly  they  "  cut  "  church  alto- 
gether.   The  Evensong  is  at  a  time  when  they  are  dressing  for 


154 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


dinner,  and  therefore  they  cannot  go  to  that.  During  the  week 
they  have  had  exhausting  mental  work,  and  their  strained  nerves 
need  relaxation.  The  entire  morning  is  broken  into  by  a  lengthy 
service,  compounded  of  Matins,  Litany,  Ante-Communion  and 
a  sermon.  Moreover  in  winter  the  days  are  short  and  the  best 
part  of  the  day  is  the  morning.  The  Sabbath  was  made  for  man 
and  not  man  for  the  Sabbath  ;  and  that  applies  to  the  Christian 
Lord's  Day  as  well  as  to  the  Jewish  day  of  rest.  If  those  who 
would  go  motoring  on  the  Sunday  would  but  remember  that 
Worship  of  God  is  a  Christian  duty  they  are  bound  to  dis- 
charge, and  go,  not  necessarily  to  communicate,  to  the  early 
celebration  of  the  Eucharist — then  they  are  free. 

But  to  return  to  the  sermon.  We  live  in  an  age  of  condensation. 
Sixty  years  ago,  when  our  insides  needed  rectifying,  senna-tea 
was  administered  in  cupfuls,  black  draughts  in  a  tumbler, 
castor-oil  was  shot  down  our  throats  from  a  table-spoon.  Now 
we  swallow  pillules  coated  with  gold  leaf  or  collodion.  Sixty 
years  ago  letters  occupied  four  sides  of  a  sheet  and  were  crossed 
and  recrossed  ;  now  half  a  dozen  lines  on  a  postcard  suffice. 
Consider  the  verbosity  of  old  novels.  Sir  Charles  Grandison  and 
Clarissa  Harlowe,  each  in  seven  volumes,  and  each  volume  con- 
taining on  an  average  370  pages.  What  verbal  padding  is  in 
Scott's  novels  !  Thackeray's  Vanity  Fair  is  told  in  520,000  words. 
Plays,  once  protracted  through  five  acts,  are  now  brought  to 
three.  A  whole  ox  is  reduced  to  a  small  pot  of  Bovril.  A  preacher 
should  bear  this  in  mind  ;  if  he  has  anything  worth  saying,  he 
can  say  it  in  ten  minutes.  In  one  of  our  cathedrals — it  may 
have  been  customary  in  others  and  be  so  still  in  the  same — the 
doors  were  locked  during  the  sermon.  Only  by  giving  tokens  of 
pressing  necessity  would  the  verger  allow  egress.  Could  a  finer 
instance  be  given  of  the  incapacity  of  the  Canons  to  maintain 
the  interest  of  a  congregation  ?  Yet  they  did  that,  and  were 
not  ashamed.  I  was  thus  locked  in  one  Sunday.  Next  day  I 
saw  a  man  in  a  farm-yard  working  a  chaff-cutter.  "  Do  the  cattle 
like  this  dry  stuff  ?  "  I  inquired.  "  Whether  they  like  it  or  no, 
they  have  got  to  eat  it.    We  have  nothing  else  to  give  them." 

A  parson  who  had  painfully  prepared  a  sermon  divided  into 
several  heads,  one  day  in  the  pulpit  forgot  the  order  of  his  parts 
or  missed  a  page  or  two.  On  returning  to  the  vestry  he  said 
apologetically  to  the  clerk  :  "I  am  afraid  I  lost  some  of  my 
heads."  "  Sir,  if  you  had  only  one  you  would  not  have  lost 
that." 


THE  CHURCH  IN  TOWNS 


155 


I  have  listened  to  preachers  in  the  London  suburbs,  able 
preachers  too,  and  listened  eagerly,  hoping  to  obtain  some  ideas 
to  use  myself ;  but  in  the  first  place  the  discourses  were  too 
long,  and  in  the  second  there  were  too  many  themes — they  jostled 
and  ran  down  each  other,  like  the  ships  of  the  Armada  in  Calais 
Harbour  ;  and  I  came  away  without  recollecting  any.  If  there 
were  ideas  in  the  sermon  they  were  too  many — some  good,  some 
indifferent.  Sometimes  there  are  really  none.  On  a  carte  in  a 
French  hotel  was  written  in  English  :  "  The  wines  at  this  estab- 
lishment are  of  such  a  quality  as  to  leave  Mr.  Traveller  absolutely 
nothing  further  to  hope  for,"  and  of  how  many  hundreds  of 
sermons  is  not  this  the  epitaph  !  The  preacher  should  never 
forget  the  maxim,  Ne  quid  nimis.  A  little  boy  taken  to  a  Natural 
History  Museum  was  shown  a  gigantic  hippopotamus.  The 
urchin  managed  to  get  his  head  inside  the  gaping  jaws,  and  on 
withdrawing  it  exclaimed, "  Lor,  mother,  there's  nothing  in  it !  " 
And  the  same  may  be  said  of  the  majority  of  the  sermons  we 
hear.  I  have  listened  to  discourses  very  eloquent ,  with  plenty 
of  florid  decoration,  but  containing  no  idea.  Preachers  should 
be  careful  not  to  be  like  the  kettles  hung  on  the  oaks  of  Dodona, 
that  clashed  in  the  wind,  and  were  listened  to  as  delivering 
oracles,  but  emitted  nothing  save  sound. 

The  late  Mr.  Knight  Watson,  who  worshipped  at  S.  Andrew's, 
Wells  Street,  and  was  a  liberal  contributor  to  the  expenses  of 
the  church,  was  solicited  one  day  by  the  churchwardens  for  a 
donation  towards  the  re-flooring  of  the  pews,  as  the  joists  were 
affected  by  dry-rot.  "  I  know  nothing  about  the  floor,"  he 
said,  "  but  I  know  there  is  plenty  of  dry-rot  in  the  pulpit."  1 

If  a  preacher  has  something  to  say,  he  can  surely  say  it  in  a 
quarter  of  an  hour.  What  he  has  to  say  is  all  the  better  for 
condensation.  Attention  cannot  be  maintained  for  longer,  unless 
the  preacher  has  exceptional  powers,  and  then  all  but  the  main 
theme  is  made  up  of  oratorical  froth. 

A  sermon  must  have  a  kernel,  a  single  kernel,  and  the 
elocutional  verbiage  that  is  projected  around  serves  only  to 
obscure  it.  Many  parochial  clergy  are  obliged  to  preach  twice 
a  Sunday,  and  they  do  their  very  best,  and  their  best  is  often 
poor  stuff.  In  fact,  a  demand  is  made  on  them  that  is  beyond 
their  capacity.  There  be  fifty-two  Sundays  in  the  year.  Two 
sermons  on  the  Lord's  Day,  others  on  Christmas  Day,  Ascension, 
and  week-days  in  Lent  and  Good  Friday  make  up  about  115 
1  This  found  its  way  into  Punch. 


156 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


sermons  in  the  year.  More  is  exacted  than  the  most  able  man 
could  accomplish  satisfactorily.  They  are  driven  to  take  a  text, 
chew  it,  and  administer  it  thus  to  their  audience,  as  nurses 
feed  babies. 

Before  the  Christian  era,  Horace  gave  this  lesson  : 

Quicquid  praecipis,  esto  brevis  ;  ut  cito  dicta 
Percipiant  animi  dociles,  teneantque  fideles. 


CHAPTER  VII 


THE  TRACTARIAN  MOVEMENT 

IDEAL  very  briefly  with  the  first  stage  of  the  Church 
Revival,  partly  because,  as  stated  in  my  Preface,  this  stage 
has  been  fully  described  by  many  writers,  and  treated  of 
in  several  biographies  ;  also  because  I  was  a  late  arrival. 
The  Tractarian  movement  began  in  1833,  I  was  not  born  till  the 
ensuing  year,  and  I  did  not  go  up  to  Cambridge  till  1852,  as 
pupil  to  the  Rev.  Harvey  Goodwin,  afterwards  Bishop  of  Carlisle, 
and  did  not  become  a  member  of  the  University  till  1853  ;  and 
the  great  debacle  was  in  1845.  Consequently  I  was  not  brought 
in  contact  with  any  of  the  Oxford  leaders,  and  when  I  was  at 
Cambridge  there  were  none  of  the  party  in  residence.  The  first, 
the  Oxford  chapter,  had  closed.  There  ensued  a  lull  before  the 
second  came  into  notice.  There  are  plants,  such  as  the  Noli-me- 
tangere,  that,  when  their  seed  is  matured,  at  a  touch,  perhaps 
only  when  swept  by  a  burning  sunbeam,  explode,  and  the  grains 
are  scattered  far  and  wide.  It  had  been  so  at  Oxford.  The 
doctrines  of  the  Church  had  ripened  in  Oriel.  Now  the  pro- 
ductive process  was  at  an  end  there,  and  the  dispersion,  the 
diffusion  of  the  seeds  over  England,  ensued.  They  took  some  time 
to  germinate.  "  There  was  silence  in  heaven  about  the  space  of 
half  an  hour;  "  and  then  the  deadly  warfare  must  begin  again 
between  the  woman  clothed  with  the  sun,  and  the  moon  under 
her  feet,  and  upon  her  head  a  crown  of  twelve  stars — and  the  red 
dragon  :  the  Church  and  the  World,  the  Church  with  Michael  and 
his  angels  on  her  side,  the  world  backed  up  by  all  the  powers 
of  evil,  of  Erastianism  and  Unbelief. 

From  what  has  been  already  said  it  will  have  been  seen  that 
every  element  of  a  Church  Revival  existed  in  the  iVnglican 
communion,  but  had  not  been  called  into  activity  and  mani- 
festation. 

There  were  many  thoughtful  men  who  saw  that  there  must 
come  a  change  in  the  Church  of  England  if  she  were  not  to  be 

157 


158 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


torn  down  and  laid  in  the  dust.  Whately  even  sketched  forth 
his  conception  of  a  Church  in  1826  as  an  organized  community, 
founded  by  Christ  Himself,  and  endowed  by  Him  with  spiritual 
powers,  and  whether  in  connection  with  the  State  or  not,  having 
its  own  moral  standard,  spirit  and  character.  On  the  other 
hand,  Dr.  Arnold  divided  the  world  into  Christians  and  non- 
Christians.  A  belief  in  Christ  sufficed  to  admit  a  man,  whether 
baptized  or  not,  into  the  brotherhood — the  Church.  Each  man 
might  believe  as  much  or  as  little  as  he  pleased.  As  to  the 
organization  of  the  Church,  that  was  in  no  case  of  Divine  in- 
stitution, and  for  the  most  part  it  had  a  mischievous  tendency. 
To  minister  the  Word  was  of  Divine  appointment,  nothing  else. 
Sacraments  were  signs  of  Divine  love,  but  of  no  special  import- 
ance, and  any  Christian  might  use  them  or  not  at  his  pleasure. 

Such  a  Church  would  be  tolerant  of  every  sort  of  misbelief, 
but  not  of  definite  faith.  In  fact  Arnold  might  be  spoken  of 
in  this  respect  as  was  Vertumno  by  Bishop  Ken  : 

He  fall  Religions  opens  the  wide  gate, 
Damns  none  but  those  who  enter  by  the  strait. 

Dr.  Arnold's  view  of  the  Church,  though  it  might  be  that 
of  the  man  of  the  world  and  the  Statesman,  who  did  not  look 
deep  into  such  matters,  was  not  one  to  commend  itself  to  earnest 
minds.  It  was  the  reduction  of  a  highly  articulated  organization 
into  something  of  a  consistency  much  like  sterilized  frog-spawn  ; 
which  would  inspire  disgust,  but  not  love.  In  Oxford  and 
throughout  the  country  in  quiet  parsonages  men  were  to  be 
found  with  very  different  conceptions  of  what  the  Church  was. 
They  held  the  view  of  Dr.  Whately,  but  they  wanted  it  to  become 
not  a  view  only,  but  a  recognised  fact  to  be  acted  upon.  They 
could  not  look  into  their  Prayer  Books  without  seeing  that  the 
Church  claimed  to  be  something  very  different  from  what  it  was 
represented  by  Dr.  Arnold,  and  was  supposed  to  be  by  the  men 
of  pleasure  and  the  ignorant.  They  could  not  fail  to  discern 
that  the  Church  was  not  a  mere  State  establishment ;  but  that 
it  claimed  an  origin  not  short  of  the  Apostles  of  Christ,  that  it 
claimed  as  well  to  speak  with  their  authority,  and  that  it  was 
an  organized  society  founded  by  Christ  Himself. 

And  this  feeling,  widely  spread,  sought  a  voice  through  which 
to  speak  and  proclaim  what  it  believed.  It  could  not  speak 
through  Convocation — that  was  muzzled.  This  was  found  in 
Newman,  Keble  and  the  other  Tract  writers.    Like  a  fresh 


THE  TRACTARIAN  MOVEMENT  159 


breeze,  the  proclamation  of  these  verities  dissipated  the  vapours 
that  had  clouded  so  many  brains ;  and  men — lay  and  clerical 
alike — exclaimed  :  "  This  is  what  we  have  always  believed,  this 
is  what  we  were  taught  in  childhood ;  but  it  was  never  put  so 
plainly  before  us  that  we  could  distinguish  every  outline." 

The  first  to  articulate  with  distinctness,  in  the  nineteenth 
century,  the  claims  of  the  English  Church,  was  Dr.  Charles  Lloyd, 
who  had  been  tutor  to  Sir  Robert  Peel,  and  was  appointed 
Divinity  Professor  at  Oxford.  He  selected  as  the  subject  of  a 
course  of  Divinity  Lectures  the  History  and  Structure  of  the 
Anglican  Prayer  Book,  a  subject  which  led  him  and  his  pupils 
after  him  to  the  examination  of  the  missal  and  the  breviary, 
and  to  the  exhibition  of  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer  as,  in  fact, 
a  translation  and  adaptation  of  these  sources. 

To  his  lectures  resorted  John  Henry  Newman,  Edward  Pusey, 
and  among  the  younger  men  R.  Hurrell  Froude,  Robert  and 
Isaac  Wilberforce,  and  Edward  Denison.  Unquestionably  it  was 
the  seed  then  sown  that  germinated  later.  Sir  W.  Palmer  did 
but  follow  out  the  line  indicated  by  Dr.  Lloyd  when  he  published 
his  Origines  Liturgiccz.1  The  fact  of  the  origin  of  our  Liturgy 
had  been  well  known  to  the  Caroline  divines,  and  had  been  noted 
by  Sparrow  in  his  Rationale,  but  it  had  dropped  into  oblivion. 
Men's  minds  had  been  too  much  engrossed  with  the  controversy 
against  Deism  to  think  of  the  structure  and  antecedents  of  the 
Liturgy.  Dr.  Lloyd  was  created  Bishop  of  Oxford  in  1827,  but 
as  he  died  in  1829  did  not  live  to  see  the  rooting  and  germination 
of  his  teaching. 

"  On  14th  July,  1833,"  Cardinal  Newman  tells  us  in  his 
Apologia,  "  Mr.  Keble  preached  the  assize  sermon  in  the  Uni- 
versity pulpit.  It  was  published  under  the  title  of  National 
Apostasy.  I  have  ever  considered  and  kept  the  day  as  the  start  of 
the  religious  movement  of  1833."  This  notable  sermon  was  the 
expression  of  alarm  felt  by  a  large  body  of  Churchmen  amid  the 
triumphs  of  the  Reform  Bill,  that  the  new  Ministry  was  preparing 
to  invade  the  rights  and  alter  the  Constitution  of  the  Church, 
and  interfere  with  the  Prayer  Book.  It  had  suppressed  ten  Irish 
bishoprics,  in  defiance  of  Church  opinion,  and  there  was  no 
calculating  how  far-going  and  how  drastic  would  be  the  treat- 
ment of  the  Church  in  England.    A  meeting  was  held  at  the 

1  Palmer  had  actually  begun  the  book  before  Dr.  Lloyd  opened  his 
lectures.  He  laid  it  aside,  but  resumed  the  work  after  the  death  of  Dr. 
Lloyd. 


160 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


close  of  July  in  the  parsonage  of  Mr.  Hugh  James  Rose,  con- 
sisting of  four  friends,  and  it  was  decided  to  produce  a  series  of 
Tracts  suitable  for  the  times. 

That  little  party  assembled  in  Hadleigh  Rectory  comprised 
the  host,  Mr.  Hugh  James  Rose,  Mr.  William  Palmer,  Mr.  A. 
Percival,  and  Mr.  R.  Hurrell  Froude. 

The  state  of  mind  in  which  these  friends  met  has  been  described 
by  one  of  them,  Mr.  Palmer,  in  his  Narrative  of  Events,  published 
in  1843  and  republished  in  1883.  "  We  felt  ourselves  assailed 
by  enemies  from  without  and  foes  within.  Our  prelates  insulted 
and  threatened  by  Ministers  of  State.  In  Ireland  ten  bishoprics 
suppressed.  We  were  advised  to  feel  thankful  that  a  far  more 
sweeping  measure  had  not  been  adopted.  What  was  to  come 
next  ?  Was  the  same  principle  of  concession  to  popular  clamour 
to  be  exemplified  in  the  dismemberment  of  the  English  Church  ? 
We  were  overwhelmed  with  pamphlets  on  Church  Reform.  .  .  . 
Or.  Arnold  of  Rugby  ventured  to  propose  that  all  sects  should  be 
united  by  Act  of  Parliament  with  the  Church  of  England.  Re- 
ports, apparently  well  founded,  were  prevalent  that  some  of  the 
Prelates  were  favourable  to  alterations  in  the  Liturgy.  Pamph- 
lets were  in  wide  circulation  recommending  the  abolition  of  the 
Creeds  (at  least  in  public  worship),  especially  urging  the  expulsion 
of  the  Athanasian  Creed  ;  the  removal  of  all  mention  of  the 
Blessed  Trinity ;  of  the  doctrine  of  Baptismal  Regeneration  j 
of  the  practice  of  Absolution.  We  knew  not  to  what  quarter 
to  look  for  support.  A  Prelacy  threatened  and  apparently 
intimidated  ;  a  Government  making  its  power  subservient  to 

agitators,  who  avowedly  sought  the  destruction  of  the  Church  

And,  worst  of  all,  no  principle  in  the  public  mind  to  which  we 
could  appeal,  an  utter  ignorance  of  all  rational  grounds  of  attach- 
ment to  the  Church  ;  an  oblivion  of  its  spiritual  character,  as 
an  institution,  not  of  man  but  of  God  ;  the  grossest  Erastianism 
most  widely  prevalent,  especially  amongst  all  classes  of  politi- 
cians. There  was  in  all  this  enough  to  appal  the  stoutest  heart ; 
and  those  who  can  recall  the  feeling  of  those  days  will  at  once 
remember  the  deep  depression  into  which  the  Church  had  fallen, 
and  the  gloomy  forebodings  universally  prevalent." 

After  the  miserable  struggles  between  Esau  and  Jacob  in 
the  womb  of  the  Mother  Church  in  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  there 
had  risen  to  the  front  a  strong  Church  party,  and  the  revival 
had  been  anti-Calvinistic.  After  the  Rebellion,  when  Puritanism 
had  enslaved  the  land,  there  was  again  a  revival,  that  was  anti- 


THE  TRACTARIAN  MOVEMENT 


161 


Presbyterian.  And  now,  after  the  long  tyranny  of  Latitudinarian- 
ism  and  Erastianism,  there  must  be  an  upheaval,  and  a  revival 
of  the  spiritual  claims  of  the  Church.  It  was  the  special  work 
of  the  Oxford  Tractarians  to  bring  into  prominence  and  to  justify 
the  principle  of  the  Church  as  the  Kingdom  of  Christ  upon  Earth, 
and  the  Sacraments  as  the  appointed  channels  of  His  Grace. 

Something  had  to  be  done,  and  done  at  once.  That  was 
felt.  The  eyes  of  the  clerical  sleepers  must  be  opened.  The 
ignorance  of  the  laity  must  be  dispelled.  The  tide,  if  possible, 
must  be  turned.  An  opportunity — a  golden  opportunity — had 
offered,  never  likely  again  to  recur,  for  the  Bishops  to  obtain 
for  the  Church  that  freedom  of  speech  and  power  of  adjusting 
herself  to  changed  conditions  of  life  which  she  absolutely  needed. 
The  Reform  Bill  had  totally  altered  the  relations  between  the 
Church  and  the  State.  No  guarantee  whatever  existed  against 
the  Ministry  being  deadly  foes  of  the  Church,  Rationalists, 
Socinians,  Roman  Catholics,  Jews,  Dissenters  ;  and  in  their 
hands  would  be  the  appointment  to  the  highest  offices  in  the 
Church,  and  the  power  to  legislate  for  the  Church.  What  the 
Bishops  should  have  done  was  to  demand,  as  the  price  of  their 
votes  for  the  Bill,  that  the  Church  should  have  accorded  to  her 
the  same  liberty  that  was  enjoyed  by  the  Dissenting  communi- 
ties. At  the  time  the  Government  would  willingly  have  granted 
so  reasonable  a  demand.  But  instead  of  doing  so,  the  Bishops 
took  the  very  opposite  course  to  that  which  they  ought  to  have 
adopted.  "  Combien  d'hommes  de  qui  la  mediocrity  a  ete*  le 
veritable  crime  !  "  In  the  First  Reform  Bill  of  183 1,  twenty-one 
Bishops  voted  against  it ;  and  when  the  Bill  was  carried  in 
1S32,  it  was  only  by  nine  votes  in  the  House  of  Lords,  so  that 
the  prelates  might  have  made  what  terms  they  liked.  Instead 
of  that,  the  course  they  took  exasperated  the  Government,  and 
roused  the  hostility  of  the  people  ;  worst  of  all,  it  induced  the 
impression  to  become  prevalent  that  the  Dissenters  were  the 
friends  of  the  liberties  of  the  people,  whereas  the  Church  was  op- 
posed to  them.  In  the  exasperation  of  the  populace,  the  Bishop's 
palace  at  Bristol  was  attacked  by  the  mob  and  burnt  down. 

Nothing  was  to  be  hoped  for  from  the  prelates.1    If  the  Church 

1  Ubi  homo  timidus  erit  in  rebus  dubiis,  nauci  non  erit. 

Quibus  res  timida  aut  turbida  est, 
Praesunt  turbare  usque,  ut  ne  quid  possit  conquiescere. 

Plaut.,  Mostell,  v.  1. 

1 1 


162 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


was  to  be  saved  it  must  be  by  the  clergy,  and  the  clergy  were 
roused  to  the  task  by  a  little  band  of  men  at  Oxford.  No  help 
whatever  was  to  be  expected  from  the  Evangelicals.  In  all 
that  concerned  the  Church  as  a  body  they  were  afflicted  with 
ophthalmia.  They  fumbled  with  individual  souls,  to  force  their 
shibboleths  upon  them.  That  was  all.  If  anything  was  to  be 
done,  it  must  be  by  men  who  stood  above  the  parterre,  men  who 
could  look  back  as  well  as  look  ahead.  Such  men  were  now  to 
come  to  the  front. 

The  first  of  the  Tracts  for  the  Times  appeared  on  September  9, 
1833,  an(i  was  from  the  pen  of  John  Henry  Newman.  He  tells 
us  himself  on  what  principle  he  started:  "  I  had  a  supreme 
confidence  in  our  cause  ;  we  were  upholding  that  primitive 
Christianity  which  was  delivered  for  all  time  by  the  early  teachers 
of  the  Church,  and  which  was  registered  and  attested  in  the 
Anglican  formularies  and  by  the  Anglican  divines.  That  ancient 
religion  had  well-nigh  faded  away  out  of  the  land,  through  the 
political  changes  of  the  last  150  years,  and  it  must  be  restored. 
It  would  be  in  fact  a  second  Reformation — a  better  Reformation 
— for  it  would  be  a  return,  not  to  the  sixteenth  century,  but  to 
the  seventeenth.  No  time  was  to  be  lost,  for  the  Whigs  had 
come  to  do  their  worst  and  the  rescue  might  come  too  late. 
Bishoprics  were  already  in  course  of  suppression ;  Church 
property  was  in  course  of  confiscation  ;  Sees  would  soon  be 
receiving  unsuitable  occupants."1 

The  Oxford  movement  seemed  about  to  carry  all  before  it. 
Its  success  was  phenomenal,  but  a  check  ensued  due  to  want  of 
discretion  on  the  part  of  one  of  the  writers.  Isaac  Williams, 
a  man  of  saintly  life  and  simple  character,  wrote  the  tract  on 
"  Reserve."  Every  sensible  man  sees  that  it  is  unwise  to  turn  a 
bull's-eye  light  upon  eyes  that  have  been  accustomed  to  twilight, 
to  stuff  with  strong  meats  a  convalescent  who  has  hitherto 
subsisted  on  gruel.  And  Isaac  Williams  advocated  reserve  in 
the  communication  of  Catholic  doctrine.  But  he  was  misunder- 
stood. It  was  supposed  that  these  writers  had  a  pack  of  Popish 
doctrines  up  their  sleeves,  to  be  leisurely  produced  as  folk  were 
prepared  to  receive  them.    Alarm  and  suspicion  were  generated. 

Then  appeared  the  famous  Tract  Ninety,  from  the  pen  of 
Newman,  in  the  spring  of  1841.    Its  purport  was  to  show  that  the 
Thirty-nine  Articles  did  not  condemn  authorised  Roman  doctrine, 
for  they  appeared  before  Roman  doctrine  had  been  finally  pro- 
1  Apologia  pro  Vita  sua  (1876),  p.  43. 


THE  TRACTARIAN  MOVEMENT  163 


mulgated  by  the  Council  of  Trent.  What  they  did  condemn  were 
popular  exaggerations.  Newman  showed  that  the  Articles  were 
capable  of  a  Catholic  interpretation,  and  that  they  were  inclu- 
sive rather  than  exclusive,  worded  with  purposeful  vagueness  in 
order  to  comprehend  those — and  they  were  the  majority  of  the 
nation — who  clung  to  old  usages  and  beliefs,  as  well  as  such  as 
had  been  infected  abroad  with  the  new  foreign  beliefs.  As  I 
have  said  in  a  former  chapter,  the  object  of  the  compilers  was 
to  comprehend  as  many  as  possible  within  the  National  Church, 
to  make  it  like  the  tree  of  Nebuchadnezzar's  vision,  extending  her 
boughs  throughout  the  land,  sheltering  in  them  the  birds  of  the 
air  and  beneath  them  the  beasts  of  the  field. 

Roman  theologians  had  addressed  themselves  to  the  same 
task — Cassander,  Francis  a  Santa  Clara,  and  Dupin.1 

The  Articles  were  dated  1563,  and  the  Papal  Confirmation  of 
the  Tridentine  Canons  did  not  take  place  till  January  26,  1564. 

What  is  now  known  to  every  student  of  the  Reformation  in 
England  was  not  known,  or  known  but  by  a  very  few,  then.  The 
Articles  were  drawn  up  as  a  compromise  between  men  who 
were  quite  willing  to  break  with  the  Pope  and  get  rid  of  gross 
and  flagrant  abuses,  but  were  not  willing  to  abandon  the  old 
theology,  and  on  the  other  side,  men  imbued  with  Protestant 
prejudices,  but  yet  not  unlearned  in  the  teaching  of  the  Fathers. 
The  Catholics  were  content  to  have  the  abuses  denounced,  so 
that  the  Catholic  faith  should  remain  intact ;  and  the  Protestants 
insisted  on  the  introduction  of  articles  capable  of  a  Lutheran 
or  a  Calvinistic  interpretation  ;  and  these  Articles  must  be  read 
and  subscribed  to  nowadays  in  the  light  of  a  compromise  of  the 
sixteenth  century  that  no  longer  affects  our  present  tenets. 

But  the  publication  of  Tract  Ninety  was,  to  say  the  least, 
injudicious,  and  Newman  was  not  justified  in  issuing  it  till  it 
had  been  approved  by  the  other  writers.  As  it  was,  only  Keble 
and  Williams  saw  it  in  proof.2 

Newman  next  deliberately  fomented  the  exasperation  felt 
consequent  on  the  appearance  of  the  Tract,  by  publishing  the 
Remains  of  R.  Hurrell  Froude,  who  in  his  letters  had  expressed 
admiration  for  the  Roman  Church,  its  ceremonies  and  its  beliefs. 

1  Dupin  wrote  his  Commonitovium,  which  was  forwarded  to  Archbishop 
Wake  in  August  171 8.  It  is  an  ingenious  attempt  to  interpret  the  Thirty- 
nine  Articles  of  the  Church  of  England  in  a  sense  not  repugnant  to  the 
doctrines  and  standards  of  the  Church  of  Rome. 

2  Isaac  Williams  tried  hard  to  dissuade  Newman  from  publishing.  Auto- 
biography, ed.  Sir  G.  Prevost  (1893),  p.  108. 


164 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Newman  was  a  self-willed  man,  and  he  felt  a  malicious  pleasure 
in  shocking  Protestant  feeling.  Two  years  previously  he  had 
written  what  he  afterwards  declared  was  intended  to  be  his 
"  last  word  as  an  Anglican  to  an  Anglican  " — why  then  did  he 
go  back  on  what  he  had  purposed  ?  With  the  smallest  grain 
of  common  sense  Newman  must  have  foreseen  the  consequences, 
the  conflagration  that  such  a  Tract  was  bound  to  produce.  And 
then,  why  did  he  aggravate  it  by  throwing  on  another  faggot  ? 

It  is  quite  true  that  many  of  the  propositions  laid  down  by 
Newman  are  now  accepted  as  well  founded,  owing  to  our  further 
knowledge  of  the  conditions  of  religious  feeling  in  the  days  of 
Elizabeth ;  but  it  was  a  fatal,  an  unpardonable  error  of  judg- 
ment to  produce  his  thesis  at  a  time  when  ignorance  was  so 
rife  and  prejudice  so  keen. 

Hitherto  hardly  any  one  in  authority  had  spoken  against 
the  movement.  It  had,  to  some  extent,  become  popular — in 
Oxford  eminently  so  among  the  ablest  and  the  holiest  of  her 
sons.  But  now,  with  the  publication  of  this  Tract,  all  was 
changed.  Four  tutors,  of  whom  H.  B.  Wilson  of  S.  John's, 
A.  C.  Tait  of  Balliol,  who  was  to  become  Archbishop  of  Canter- 
bury, were  the  most  conspicuous,  at  once  denounced  it,  and  the 
Board  of  the  Heads  of  Houses  issued  a  condemnation.  After 
that  ensued  a  tempest  of  suspicion  and  hostility,  and  loud  outcries 
against  the  writers  of  the  Tracts  as  men  disloyal  and  conspiring 
to  Romanize  the  Church  of  England — dishonest  in  interpretation 
of  her  Articles,  by  taking  them  in  a  non-natural  sense.  For 
over  forty  years  the  party  was  thus  branded.  Its  principles 
were  savagely  attacked  alike  by  Latitudinarians,  who  themselves 
used  largely  a  non-natural  interpretation,  by  Evangelicals,  who 
were  notoriously  guilty  of  depraving  the  teaching  of  the  Church, 
and  by  frightened  Churchmen.  "  Slowly  and  painfully,  amid 
opposition,  discouragement  and  desertion,  it  had  to  work  its 
way  to  public  recognition,  as  one  of  many  possible  theories  of 
the  English  Church,  which  at  least  seemed  to  have  the  power 
of  making  men  earnest  and  active.  Further  than  that  it  can 
hardly  be  said  that  organized  public  opinion  has  as  yet 
gone."  1 

Every  movement  produces  a  host  of  free-lances  and  skirmishers 
who  go  far  ahead  of  the  main  army.  It  was  so  notably  among 
the  Tractarians.  A  fissure  soon  appeared  between  the  sober 
and  sound  men,  who  had  been  brought  up  from  childhood  in 

1  Wakeman,  History  of  the  Church  of  England  (1904),  p.  474. 


THE  TRACTARIAN  MOVEMENT  165 


Church  principles,  and  who  loved  the  Church  as  their  spiritual 
mother,  and  a  party  of  hot-headed  enthusiasts  such  as  Ward 
and  Oakeley,  who  scoffed  at  the  Anglican  Communion,  exag- 
gerated all  its  weaknesses,  and  belauded  everything  that  was 
Roman,  whilst  shutting  their  eyes  to  the  blemishes  of  the  Papal 
Church.  This  disloyal  spirit  found  utterance  in  Ward's  Ideal 
of  a  Christian  Church  (1844).  But  it  had  been  preceded  by 
articles  in  the  British  Critic,  so  hostile  to  the  claims  of  the  English 
Communion  that  it  lost  its  subscribers,  and  perished  ignomini- 
ously  in  the  autumn  of  1843.  Ward's  book  was  condemned  by 
the  University  of  Oxford  and  himself  degraded  from  his  Univer- 
sity degrees.  Ward  had  claimed  a  right  to  hold  the  entire  circle 
of  Roman  doctrine  whilst  remaining  a  member  of  the  English 
Church — a  monstrous  claim  ;  and  the  condemnation  of  his 
book  was  amply  justified. 

These  men  elbowed  out,  or  tried  to  elbow  out,  the  cooler 
fathers  of  the  Oxford  movement.  The  relation  was  much  like 
— as  has  been  remarked — that  of  the  Jacobins  to  the  Girondists, 
men  self-willed,  impatient  of  control,  restless,  dissatisfied,  and 
despising  those  who  clung  to  the  old  way. 

In  1850,  Dr.  Hook  wrote  of  this  class :  "  I  now  find  them 
calumniators  of  the  Church  of  England,  and  vindicators  of  the 
Church  of  Rome  ;  palliating  the  vices  of  the  Romish  system, 
and  magnifying  the  deficiencies  of  the  Church  of  England  ; 
sneering  at  everything  Anglican,  and  admiring  everything 
Romish  ;  students  of  the  breviary  and  missal,  disciples  of  the 
schoolmen,  converts  to  medievalism,  insinuating  Romish 
practices  in  their  private,  and  infusing  a  Romish  tone  into 
their  public  devotions  ;  introducing  the  Romish  confessional, 
enjoining  Romish  penance ;  adopting  Romish  prostrations, 
recommending  Romish  litanies  ;  muttering  Romish  shibboleths, 
and  rejoicing  in  the  cant  of  Romish  fanaticism  ;  assuming  some- 
times the  garb  of  the  Romish  priesthood,  and  venerating  without 
imitating  their  celibacy;  defending  Romish  miracles,  and  receiving 
as  true  the  lying  legends  of  Rome  ;  almost  adoring  Romish 
saints,  and  complaining  that  we  have  had  no  saints  in  England 
since  we  purified  our  Church." 

This  is  to  a  limited  extent  true  ;  every  stream  as  it  rushes 
over  impediments  throws  up  a  froth,  and  these  men  were  the 
froth  that  lodged  elsewhere  than  in  the  current  that  flowed  on 
steadily,  divinely  guided,  in  the  Anglican  Communion.  It  was 
such  as  these  who  produced  suspicion,  and  did  much  to  hamper 


166 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


the  progress  of  the  movement.  They  went — after  having  done 
incalculable  mischief  to  the  cause. 

What  neither  the  Heads  of  the  Houses  at  Oxford  nor  the 
Bishops  on  their  bench  saw  was  that  there  could  not  have  been 
so  widespread  and  enthusiastic  a  movement  for  reform  unless 
there  had  been  a  real  cause  for  it.  The  sole  wise  policy,  when- 
soever and  wheresoever  there  is  impatience  for  a  reformation,  is 
to  see  where  is  the  focus  of  the  agitation,  and  what  is  its  raison 
d'etre.  If  the  Bishops  in  England  at  the  outbreak  of  Trac- 
tarianism  had  possessed  any  wisdom  they  would  have  recognized 
that  it  was  a  force,  a  living  force,  and  had  they  attempted  to 
direct  it,  they  might  have  done  with  it  what  they  would.  When 
a  whale  tore  a  hole  in  the  vessel  that  contained  Baron  Mun- 
chausen, he  stopped  the  leak  by  sitting  on  the  orifice.  They 
adopted  the  Munchausen  method.  How  could  these  Bishops 
suppose  that  their  puny  efforts  would  staunch  the  gap  and  drive 
back  the  waves  ? 

In  1841,  Sumner  of  Chester,  Boustead  of  Lichfield,  Maltby  of 
Durham,  and  in  1842  Copleston  of  Llandaff ,  Pepys  of  Worcester, 
Musgrave  of  Hereford,  Thirlwall  of  S.  David's,  Blomfield  of 
London,  even  Denison  of  Salisbury  and  Bagot  of  Oxford,  with 
varying  degrees  of  decision,  charged  against  the  movement. 
E  pur  si  muove.  Dr.  Pusey  wrote :  "I  remember  Newman 
saying,  '  Oh,  Pusey !  we  have  leant  on  the  Bishops,  and  they 
have  broken  down  under  us !'  ...  I  thought  to  myself,  1  At 
least  I  never  leant  on  the  Bishops.  I  leant  on  the  Church  of 
England.' " 1 

Dr.  (afterwards  Sir  Edward)  Barry,  an  Irish  physician,  who 
came  to  London,  and  is  mentioned  by  Boswell,  maintained  that 
death  was  due  to  active  pulsation,  and  that  to  be  healthy 
every  possible  means  must  be  employed  to  reduce  the  pulse  to 
its  slowest  beat  short  of  stopping  altogether.  In  their  dealings 
with  the  Church  the  Bishops  were  of  Barry's  opinion. 

For  many  generations  no  writers  had  written  with  such  force 
and  good  faith  to  rally  Churchmen  to  the  side  of  the  Bishops, 
none  had  pointed  out  so  clearly  their  Apostolic  authority,  and 
had  so  impressed  on  all  Churchmen  the  duty  of  allegiance  to  it, 
as  did  the  early  Tract  writers.  And  now  the  Bishops  turned 
against  them.  The  Tractarians  had  sought,  like  Aaron  and  Hur, 
to  stay  up  the  arms  of  the  episcopate,  whilst  the  war  raged 
between  the  Church  and  the  World,  and  now — it  was  as  though 

1  Life,  ii.  236. 


THE  TRACTARIAN  MOVEMENT  167 


Moses  smote  them  in  the  face  with  clenched  fists,  and  refused 
their  advocacy.  It  is  hardly  to  be  wondered  at,  that  so  many 
hearts  failed,  that  to  many  confidence  in  the  Church  of  England 
broke  down,  when  Heads  of  Houses,  Bishops,  Ministers,  Judges, 
Journalists  combined  to  denounce  the  movement,  and  say  "  We 
have  no  part  with  you."  Discouragement,  despair,  took  hold 
of  their  spirits,  and  they  turned  their  backs  on  a  Church  which, 
as  they  supposed,  disowned  them  as  her  children. 

The  stream  of  secessions  to  Rome  began  with  Mr.  Sibthorp,1 
who  had  been  a  distinguished  Evangelical  preacher  ;  he  joined 
the  Church  of  Rome  in  1841.  They  became  very  numerous ; 
parish  priests,  college  fellows,  noblemen  and  ladies  of  rank, 
even  schoolboys,  went  to  Rome,  despairing  of  the  English 
Church,  which  they  considered  could  not  escape  wreckage,  and 
that  there  was  no  hope  of  obtaining  recognition  and  respect  for 
Church  principles  either  from  the  State  or  from  the  public. 

The  Evangelicals  and  Broad  Churchmen  exulted.  These  men, 
said  they,  have  thrown  off  the  mask  at  last,  and  revealed  them- 
selves as  Papists  at  heart  whilst  they  were  in  the  Established 
Church.  They  have  been  traitors  all  along,  and  such  as  remain 
are  cowards  eating  the  bread  of  the  Protestant  Church  whilst 
sapping  the  foundations. 

The  extraordinary  fact  is  that  not  only  did  these  Evangelicals 
persuade  themselves  that  this  was  the  case,  but  this  also  was 
the  popular  opinion  throughout  the  land,  proclaimed  by  the 
press,  from  the  pulpit,  and  on  the  platform.  Let  us  see  whether 
any  justification  whatever  existed  for  this  view  of  the  Trac- 
tarians. 

Now  the  Evangelicals  notoriously  disregarded  the  commands 
of  the  Church,  and  as  notoriously  and  avowedly  disbelieved  in 
certain  doctrines  she  enunciated  in  her  formularies. 

Indeed,  they  entered  into  a  league  to  obtain  the  revision  of 
the  Book  of  Common  Prayer,  the  elimination  of  all  those  rubrics 
they  did  not  observe,  and  the  excision  of  all  those  doctrines 
in  which  they  did  not  believe.  Who  then  were  the  traitors  ? 
Certainly  not  the  Tractarians,  who  strove  to  bring  practice  up 
to  the  requirements  of  the  rubrics,  and  teaching  to  be  in  accord- 
ance with  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer.  For  this  they  were 
denounced.    Let  me  take  one  illustration  : 

1  Sibthorp  returned  to  the  English  Church  in  1843,  "verted"  again 
in  1865.  He  died  in  1879,  and  was  buried  by  his  own  desire  with  the 
burial  service  of  the  English  Church  in  the  Lincoln  cemetery. 


168 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


120  gr. 
12  gr. 
12  minims 
6  drachms 


Aquae  quantum  suff. 


Now  let  us  suppose  that  the  patient  fills  his  bottle  with  a  mixture 
of  castor  oil,  senna  and  Epsom  salts  in  place  of  what  is  ordered. 
A  practitioner,  finding  him  in  a  debilitated  condition,  inquires 
what  medicine  he  has  been  taking.  The  sick  man  produces 
the  mixture  and  the  prescription.  "  Good  Heavens  !  "  exclaims 
the  medical  man,  "  this  is  not  what  has  been  ordered  you. 
Chuck  this  mess  away  and  go  back  to  the  original  prescription. 
As  far  as  I  can  see  and  smell,  there  is  nothing  in  your  bottle 
that  was  required  except  Aqua  quantum  suff." 

This  is  precisely  the  position  assumed  by  the  men  of  the 
Oxford  movement.  They  said :  "Go  back  to  the  principles 
and  practice  enjoined  in  the  Prayer  Book,  and  throw  away  all 
the  nauseous  stuff  you  have  imported  from  Geneva  and  Scotland, 
from  France  and  from  Holland. 

How  completely  the  public  generally  misconceived  the  situa- 
tion may  be  seen  from  a  cartoon  that  appeared  in  the  Hornet, 
in  which  the  Bishop  of  London  (Tait)  is  represented  as  arresting 
a  Puseyite  burglar  attempting  to  force  an  entry  into  a  Protestant 
church.  Whereas,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  it  was  the  Tractarian 
party  that  maintained  the  House  and  guarded  its  treasures 
against  those  who  would  throw  them  out  of  the  window,  strip 
it  of  its  valuables,  and  leave  it  empty,  swept  and  desolate. 

In  the  Ely  fens,  the  soil,  spent,  moss-  and  weed-grown,  has  to 
be  regenerated  by  digging  up  the  subsoil,  and  that  rich  subsoil 
is  spread  over  the  surface  and  proves  a  mighty  fertilizer.  That 
fat  subsoil  has  ever  been  in  situ,  but  has  lain  unobserved  because 
overlaid.  The  High-Church  party  was  digging  into  the  rich 
Catholic  subsoil,  bringing  it  to  day,  and  spreading  it  over  the 
face  of  the  Church  in  faith,  looking  for  a  harvest. 

At  Oxford  the  Church  Revival  was  doctrinal ;  it  took  another 
form  in  the  sister  University. 

The  Cambridge  Camden  Society  started  a  magazine  called  the 
Ecclesiologist,  advocating  correct  principles  of  Church  building 
and  furnishing.  In  1841  it  had  a  rare  chance  of  carrying  these 
principles  into  action.  The  Norman  round  church  of  S.  Sepulchre, 
Cambridge,  partly  fell  down,  and  the  Cambridge  Camden 


FALSE  KEYS 


THE  TRACTARIAN  MOVEMENT  169 


Society  undertook  the  restoration.  The  work  was  then  excel- 
lently done,  its  only  weak  point  being  the  stained  glass,  the 
true  principles  of  coloration  and  manufacture  being  at  that 
time  not  understood. 

In  1848  the  Society  adopted  a  seal  designed  by  Pugin.  In 
the  midst  were  figures  of  the  Virgin  and  Child,  between  S.  George, 
S.  Etheldreda,  S.  John  and  S.  Mark.  The  Rev.  F.  Close  of 
Cheltenham  published  a  sermon  against  the  Society  full  of  quo- 
tations from  their  organ,  the  Ecclesiologist,  and  showed  himself 
especially  indignant  about  the  seal.  Mr.  Close's  sermon  was 
entitled  "  The  Restoration  of  Churches  is  the  Restoration  of 
Popery."  Mr.  Close — afterwards  made  a  dean,  on  the  principle 
then  acted  on,  all  but  invariably,  of  putting  a  man  into  a  place 
for  which  he  was  entirely  unsuited — Mr.  Close  was  a  much- 
admired  Evangelical  preacher,  with  a  choir  of  rapturous  females 
circling  round  his  car,  like  Guido's  picture  of  Apollo  and  the 
Hours  ;  only  for  the  fair  Horce  we  must  substitute  ancient 
spinsters. 

The  movement  in  Cambridge  for  a  return  to  Gothic  archi- 
tecture was  but  a  part  of  the  general  revolt  against  the  cult 
of  the  Ugly  that  had  prevailed  in  the  eighteenth  century. 

Pierre  de  Coulevin  says  : 

"  Beauty !  Cromwell,  the  Reformation,  the  Puritans  had 
expelled  it,  as  they  had  Colour  and  Grace.  Under  their  action, 
the  garments  became  gloomy,  the  lines  rigid,  the  physiognomies 
hard  and  muddy,  the  movements  of  the  body  automatic.  They 
had  created  that  special  type  of  Hideousness  which  for  a  long 
time  was  the  amusement  of  the  rest  of  Europe.  It  was  a 
reaction  against  the  softness,  the  sensuousness,  the  Catholicism, 
above  all  a  reaction  of  the  Masculine  against  the  feminine,  intro- 
duced by  the  Stuarts,  and  which  menaced  the  genius  of  the  race. 

"  In  the  midst  of  last  Century,  the  Unknown  Isle  had  an 
altogether  glacial  appearance.  One  might  have  supposed  that 
it  belonged  to  a  different  planet,  a  planet  at  a  remote  distance 
from  the  sun.  The  houses  were  grey,  the  roofs  flat,  the  interiors 
cold  and  bare,  life  of  oppressive  uniformity."1 

But  nowhere  had  Ugliness  so  enthroned  herself  as  in  the 
House  of  God  j  and  when  a  wave  of  revolt  against  its  domination 
rolled  over  the  land,  then  inevitably  its  waters  entered  the 
Churches  to  regenerate  them.2 

1  L'lle  Inconnue,  p.  373. 

2  In  Humphry  Clinker,  Smollett  writes  :  "  The  external  appearance  of  an 


170 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


It  is  not  a  matter  of  surprise  if  many  of  those  who  had  been 
reared  in  the  cuit  of  the  Ugly  should  resent  the  change,  and 
cling  to  the  old  deformities.  The  natives  of  East  Africa  draw 
down  the  upper  lip  to  their  chins,  and  their  ear-lobes  to  their 
shoulders,  and  ring  the  cartilages  of  their  noses.  These  dis- 
figurements they  esteem  beauties,  and  fail  to  appreciate  beauty 
as  God  created  it. 

The  movement  was  assisted  by  ridicule  being  turned  upon 
the  worshippers  of  Ugliness. 

Welby  Pugin,  in  his  Contrasts,  held  up  to  public  scorn  the  taste 
of  his  day.  He  showed,  among  other  things,  what  S.  Saviour's, 
Southwark,  had  been  and  what  it  had  become,  when  the  nave 
was  pulled  down  and  replaced  by  a  miserable  white-brick  erection. 
Little  did  he  dream  then  that  the  beautiful  church  would  be 
restored  to  the  condition  in  which  it  had  been  before  its  partial 
destruction.  Paget  also,  in  S.  Antholin's,  described  with  great 
humour  Mr.  Compo  and  a  church  of  his  erection ;  and  Paley 
in  The  Church  Restorers  gibbeted  Mr.  Carter.  This  frightened 
architects,  lest  they  should  be  put  in  the  same  category  as 
Mr.  Compo  or  Mr.  Carter. 

In  the  face  of  so  much  ignorance,  prejudice  and  barbarism, 
it  might  well  have  seemed  hopeless  to  effect  a  revolution  in 
ecclesiastical  art,  ritual  or  dogma.  But,  as  Calonne  said  to 
Marie  Antoinette  :  "  Si  la  chose  est  possible,  elle  est  faite  ;  si 
elle  est  impossible,  elle  se  fera." 

old  cathedral  cannot  but  be  displeasing  to  the  eye  of  every  man  who  has 
any  idea  of  propriety  and  proportion,  even  though  he  may  be  ignorant  of 
architecture  as  a  science  ;  and  the  long  slender  spire  puts  one  in  mind  of 
a  criminal  impaled,  with  a  sharp  stake  rising  up  through  his  shoulders. 
There  is  nothing  of  this  Arabic  architecture  in  the  Assembly  rooms  (at 
York),  which  seem  to  me  to  have  been  built  upon  a  design  of  Palladio,  and 
might  be  converted  into  an  elegant  place  of  worship." 


CHAPTER  VIII 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


HE  Church  in  the  Victorian  age,  like  Alonzo  in  The 
Tempest,  might  ask  : 

Give  us  kind  keepers,  Heavens  !  What  are  these  ? 


and  alas,  the  answer  must  have  been  that  of  Sebastian  : 
A  living  drollery, 

or  rather  "  a  tragedy  "  for  the  Church — only  in  themselves  "  a 
drollery."  I  am  sorry  to  have  to  write  of  the  bishops  of  the 
period,  as  I  must.  They  helped  to  make  Church  history,  and 
they  must  be  judged  by  what  they  were  and  what  they  did. 

In  the  early  days  of  the  nineteenth  century  the  bishoprics 
were  bestowed  on  men  of  political  influence — if  not  so  themselves, 
yet  belonging  to  families  with  such;  or  were  connected  with 
noble  families.  Lord  Auckland,  who  had  been  chaplain  to  King 
William  IV,  was  given  the  bishopric  of  Bath  and  Wells,  and  he 
was  succeeded  by  Lord  Arthur  Charles  Hervey.  The  Hon.  John 
Thomas  Pelham,  son  of  the  Earl  of  Chichester,  was  made  Bishop 
of  Norwich;  to  the  Hon.  Richard  Bagot,  son  of  Baron  Bagot, 
was  accorded  the  bishopric  of  Oxford,  and  later  that  of  Bath 
and  Wells.  He  had  married  a  daughter  of  the  Earl  of  Jersey. 
The  Hon.  George  Pelham,  son  of  the  first  Earl  of  Chichester,  was 
made  Bishop  of  Bristol,  then  transferred  to  Exeter,  and  thence 
to  Lincoln.  Horatio  Powys,  given  the  bishopric  of  Sodor  and 
Man,  was  son  of  the  second  Baron  Lilford.  Pepys  of  Worcester 
belonged  to  the  family  of  Earl  Cottenham.  Lord  George  Murray 
was  made  Bishop  of  S.  David's,  and  he  was  the  son  of  the  Duke 
of  Athol,  and  his  son  George  was  given  the  bishopric  of  Rochester. 
Edward  Grey,  Bishop  of  Hereford,  was  the  brother  of  Earl  Grey. 
And  so  on  ;  as  the  Times  said  :  "  Their  names  are  not  only 
written  in  the  Book  of  Life,  but  also  in  the  Peerage."  Or  else 
they  were  heads  of  colleges,  masters  of  great  public  schools,  or 


172 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


were  noted  for  their  Greek  and  Latin  scholarship.  Most  ex- 
ceptionally were  they  men  who  had  done  parochial  work. 

One  instance  may  be  given  to  show  the  methods  by  means 
of  which  mitres  were  supposed  to  be  acquired.  The  Rev.  Charles 
Sumner  was  travelling  tutor  to  the  son  of  the  Marquess  of  Conyng- 
ham.  When  they  were  in  Switzerland,  the  youth  fell  in  love 
with  the  daughter  of  a  Genevan  pastor,  Mile.  Mounoir,  and  the 
tutor  saved  his  pupil  from  a  social  calamity  by  himself  marrying 
the  young  lady.1  In  reward  for  this  service,  so  it  was  said  at 
the  time,  he  was  given  one  preferment  after  another,  then  the 
bishopric  of  Llandaff,  and  in  1827  that  of  Winchester,  which  he 
held  for  forty-two  years.  He  was  a  man  of  stately  appearance 
and  courtly  manners,  but  a  narrow-minded  Evangelical.  He 
refused  to  license  John  Mason  Neale  to  the  curacy  of  Guildford, 
because  he  belonged  to  the  Cambridge  Camden  Society,  that 
concerned  itself  with  the  revival  of  Gothic  architecture  ;  and 
for  years  he  kept  John  Keble's  curate,  the  Rev.  Peter  Young, 
in  deacon's  orders. 

A  clergyman  who  had  seceded  to  Rome  wished  to  return  to  the 
Anglican  Communion.  He  opened  communications  with  Bishop 
Sumner,  and  lived  in  retirement  for  three  years,  with  the  avowed 
purpose  of  resuming  work  in  the  English  Church.  The  pro- 
bationary term  having  expired,  the  Bishop  heard — apparently 
from  a  Roman  Catholic  priest  who  wished  to  hinder  his  return- — 
that  the  penitent  clergyman  had  been  seen  in  a  Roman  Catholic 
chapel ;  whereupon  the  Bishop  wrote  to  him  in  a  strain  which 
effectually  destroyed  all  wish  to  become  again  a  member  of  the 
Anglican  Communion. 

Mr.  F.  Arnold  in  a  book  quoted  below  says  of  him  :  "  Dr. 
Sumner,  if  he  had  not  been  Bishop  of  Winchester,  would  have  held 
a  very  modest  and  unpretending  position  of  his  own — in  plain 
words  he  was  a  man  of  limited  intelligence,  strong  prejudices, 

1  Mr.  Arnold,  in  Our  Bishops  and  Deans  (London,  1875),  throws  doubts 
on  the  accuracy  of  the  story.  But  the  Conyngham  influence  was  un- 
questionably exerted  strongly  to  get  him  advanced.  Even  when  a  curate, 
King  George  IV  was  induced  to  nominate  him  to  a  canonry  at  Windsor, 
and  this  was  only  not  effected  through  the  remonstrance  of  Lord  Liverpool. 
It  is  significant  that  in  the  Life  of  Bishop  Sumner  by  his  son  the  Marchioness 
of  Conyngham  is  not  once  mentioned,  yet  it  was  due  to  her  that  royal 
patronage  literally  showered  benefits  upon  him.  Between  April  182 1  and 
November  1827  he  was  made  Historiographer,  Chaplain  to  the  King, 
and  Librarian  in  Ordinary  ;  Vicar  of  S.  Helen's,  Abingdon  ;  Canon  of 
Worcester  ;  Canon  of  Canterbury  ;  Dean  of  S.  Paul's,  Bishop  of  Llandaff, 
Bishop  of  Winchester.  Mr.  G.  Sumner  draws  a  discreet  veil  over  the 
Marchioness  and  what  she  did  for  her  protege. 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


173 


and  of  commonplace  abilities.  While  Presbyterians  were  thank- 
ful for  the  sympathy  which  they  have  received  from  him,  and 
he  was  willing  to  act  in  conjunction  with  Dissenters  and  others 
on  the  widest  possible  platform,  the  great  Church  movement  in 
this  country  received  from  him  only  a  very  languid  measure  of 
support."  This  is  an  understatement  :  he  opposed  the  Church 
movement  in  every  way  he  was  able.  He  hardly  ever  spoke  in 
the  House  of  Lords,  and  wrote  nothing  worth  reading. 

Some  of  the  Evangelical  prelates  learned  to  be  broad  in  sym- 
pathy with  those  with  whom  they  were  brought  in  contact  in 
their  dioceses,  and  who  belonged  to  the  High-Church  school. 
Sumner  learnt  nothing  : 

Homine  imperito  nunquam  quidquam  injustius, 
Qui,  nisi  quod  ipse  fecit,  nihil  rectum  putat. 

Terent.,  Adelphi,  i.  2. 

On  his  appointment  to  Llandaff  he  spoke  out  loudly  in 
disapprobation  of  translations,  and  within  a  twelvemonth 
was  himself  translated  to  Winchester.  "  This  will  please  the 
Marchioness  of  Conyngham,"  said  the  King.  He  was  wont  to 
attend  annually  the  May  meetings  at  Exeter  Hall.  He  was  a 
great  grower  of  orchids,  and  had  magnificent  conservatories  at 
Farnham  Castle.  He  succeeded  in  bringing  his  brother  John 
Bird  into  notice  with  George  IV,  and  this  latter  was  given  the 
bishopric  of  Chester  in  1838  by  Peel ;  and  in  1848  the  arch- 
bishopric of  Canterbury,  which  he  obsessed  till  1862.  When 
Bishop  of  Chester,  immediately  on  his  consecration,  John  Bird 
Sumner  denounced  the  Tractarians  and  their  work  as  the  "  under- 
mining of  the  foundations  of  the  Protestant  Church  by  men  who 
dwell  within  the  walls  ;  "  and  the  bad  faith  of  those  "  who  sat 
in  the  Reformers'  seat,  and  traduced  the  Reformation."  In  a 
later  charge  he  described  the  movement  as  the  work  of  Satan. 

George  Davys  was  made  Dean  of  Chester  and  Bishop  of 
Peterborough  because  he  had  been  tutor  to  Princess  (afterwards 
Queen)  Victoria  from  1827  to  1837,  so  tnat  ne  began  to  instruct 
her  when  she  was  eight  years  old.  He  was  made  Bishop  in  1839. 
He  was  an  Evangelical ;  he  did  what  he  could  to  enlighten 
ignorant  country  folk  in  Church  truths.  He  wrote  Village 
Conversations  on  the  Liturgy  of  the  Church  of  England  in  1820. 
Village  Conversations  on  the  Offices  of  the  Church  in  1825,  and 
A  Village  Conversation  on  the  Catechism  in  1836.  A  simple, 
amiable  and  pious  man,  who  would  have  done  well  in  a  country 


174 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


cure,  but  was  wholly  out  of  place  as  a  bishop,  as  might  be  a 
corporal  suddenly  elevated  to  be  a  general  of  a  division . 

Lord  Beaconsfield  in  Tancred  describes  the  bishops  appointed 
by  Sir  Robert  Peel : 

"  The  Arch-Mediocrity  who  then  governed  the  country  was 
impressed  with  the  necessity  of  reconstructing  the  Episcopal 
bench  on  principles  of  personal  distinction  and  ability.  But  his 
notion  of  clerical  capacity  did  not  soar  higher  than  a  private 
tutor  who  had  suckled  a  young  nobleman  into  University 
honours  ;  and  his  test  of  priestly  celebrity  was  the  decent  editor- 
ship of  a  Greek  play.  He  sought  for  the  stewards  of  the  mysteries 
of  Sinai  and  of  Calvary  among  third-rate  hunters  after  syllables. 
These  men,  notwithstanding  their  elevation,  with  one  exception 
subsided  into  their  natural  insignificance ;  and  during  our  agitated 
age,  when  the  principles  of  all  institutions,  sacred  and  secular, 
have  been  called  in  question  ;  when  alike  in  the  senate  and  the 
market-place,  both  the  doctrine  and  the  discipline  of  the  Church 
had  been  impugned,  its  power  assailed,  its  authority  denied — 
not  a  voice  was  raised  by  these  mitred  nullities,  either  to  warn 
or  to  vindicate;  not  a  phrase  escaped  their  lips  or  their  pens 
that  ever  influenced  public  opinion,  touched  the  heart  of  the 
nation,  or  guided  the  conscience  of  a  perplexed  people." 

But  there  was  one  notable  exception  to  the  quality  of  the 
Peelite  Bishops,  and  that  was  Samuel  Wilberforce,  who  was 
appointed  to  the  bishopric  of  Oxford  in  1846.  To  some  extent 
he  owed  his  elevation  to  the  respect  with  which  his  father  had 
been  regarded,  a  man  of  the  early  Evangelical  school;  but 
chiefly  to  his  abilities  as  a  public  speaker.  I  met  him  two  or 
three  times  ;  his  presence  was  commanding,  and  he  had  a  fine, 
sonorous  organ.  He  was  very  ready  to  catch  a  point  and  turn 
it  to  advantage.  I  remember  a  visit  he  made  to  Hurstpierpoint 
College.  At  that  time  the  chapel  was  the  undercroft  of  the  hall. 
Access  to  it  was  obtained  from  the  cloisters  through  a  very  dark, 
unlighted  antechapel,  if  such  can  be  called  what  was  little  other 
than  a  cellar.  The  Bishop  was  to  preach  in  the  evening,  and  the 
procession  formed  in  the  cloister.  The  season  was  All  Saints' 
Eve.  The  Bishop  grasped  the  situation,  and  preached  on  the 
Continuity  of  the  Church  in  Paradise  with  that  on  Earth.  As 
the  procession  went  singing  through  the  cloisters  so  moved 
on  the  living  Church;  then  came  the  descent  into  the  dark 
crypt  of  Death,  but  beyond  that  could  be  seen  the  illumina- 
tion of  the  throne  of  God,  to  which  we  were  all  moving,  and 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


175 


from  which  the  light  streamed  in  our  faces  as  we  made  the  dark 
descent. 

He  was  the  first  of  the  Bishops  of  the  Victorian  age  to  show 
what  the  duties  of  a  bishop  were.  He  hastened  about  his 
diocese,  visiting  the  clergy,  confirming,  encouraging,  comforting. 
Realising  how  miserably  inefficient  the  preparation  was  for 
Holy  Orders,  he  instituted  the  Cuddesdon  Training  College,  for 
young  men  after  leaving  the  University. 

He  may  truly  be  said  to  have  recast  the  whole  idea  of  the 
Episcopate,  and  to  have  successfully  raised  the  tone  of  clerical 
life. 

Cuddesdon  Training  College  was  violently  assailed  by  Mr. 
Golightly,  who  sent  his  accusations  against  it  in  a  pamphlet  to 
all  the  bishops.  Some  of  them  became  nervous,  and  Bishop 
Wilberforce  invited  them  to  his  palace  at  Cuddesdon  to  in- 
vestigate the  teaching  and  practices  there  for  themselves.  They 
came.  In  the  College  chapel,  on  the  east  wall  right  and  left  of 
the  altar,  one  of  the  students  had  painted  figures  of  saints  in 
sepia.  Bishop  Wilberforce  covered  them  all  over  with  a  panelling 
of  oak.  When  he  visited  the  chapel  with  his  timorous  flock 
of  bishops  he,  with  his  own  hands,  removed  the  altar-cross  and 
set  it  on  the  credence  table. 

He  had  inherited  from  his  Evangelical  father  an  intense 
horror  of  Rome,  and  this  was  deepened  by  the  secession  of  his 
brother  Robert  Isaac  in  1854,  as  we^  as  n^s  other  two  brothers, 
his  brothers-in-law  with  one  exception,  and  his  only  daughter 
with  her  husband. 

At  one  time  he  was  high  in  favour  at  Court,  and  intimate 
with  Prince  Albert.  But  when  he  protested  against  the  ap- 
pointment of  Hampden  to  the  bishopric  of  Hereford,  and  later 
when  he  endeavoured  to  obtain  some  justice  to  be  done  to  the 
Catholic  party,  the  Prince  and  the  Queen,  who  were  both  bitterly 
prejudiced  against  it,  showed  him  marked  coldness.  It  was 
not  till  1869  that  he  was  transferred  to  Winchester,  on  the 
nomination  of  Mr.  Gladstone. 

Bishop  Wilberforce  was  commonly  called  "  Soapy  Sam  "  1 — 

1  On  the  occasion  of  a  Cuddesdon  festival,  the  luncheon  tent  was 
decorated  with  evergreens,  and  behind  the  episcopal  chair  was  inscribed 
in  large  letters  S.O.  and  close  by  A. P.,  the  initials  of  Alfred  Potts,  the 
first  principal.  "Soap!"  exclaimed  the  Bishop.  "  That  is  too  personal : 
take  those  letters  away." 

The  vice-principal  was  Liddon.  The  Bishop  said — "Now  I  have  here 
a  pott  with  the  lid-on." 


176 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


as  he  used  to  say,  because  he  came  out  of  every  transaction 
with  clean  hands,  not  because  he  was  supposed  to  be  fulsomely 
gracious  to  every  one  with  whom  he  was  brought  in  contact, 
without  real  sincerity  at  the  back.  But  this  was  an  unjust 
charge  against  him.  At  a  time  when  prelates  were  so  puffed 
up  with  their  own  consequence  that  they  showed  what  they 
were  by  chill  of  manner  towards  their  subordinates,  and  treated 
their  clergy  de  haut  en  has  with  no  graciousness  and  no  sympathy, 
Wilberforce  studied  to  be  gentle  and  courteous  to  all,  to  the 
humblest  curate,  and  the  gruffest  churchwarden.  It  was  because 
this  was  so  unusual  that  people  could  hardly  believe  it  was 
prompted  by  a  truly  gentlemanly  feeling.  The  text  given  him 
by  Dr.  Littledale,  with  a  change  of  sex  ran  :  "  He  brought  forth 
butter  in  a  lordly  dish."  1  It  was  generally  thought  that  the 
ambition  of  his  life  was  to  become  Archbishop  of  York,  he 
being  of  a  Yorkshire  family  and  understanding  the  Yorkshire 
character  intimately.  That  he  would  have  been  enthusiasti- 
cally welcomed  there  and  would  have  advanced  the  cause  of 
the  Church  there  enormously  cannot  be  questioned.  For  that 
reason  possibly  he  was  not  given  the  chance.  Of  the  immense 
debt  of  gratitude  the  Church  owes  and  will  ever  owe  to  Bishop 
Wilberforce  we  are  hardly  yet  in  a  position  to  realize.  He  was 
the  balance  wheel  which  kept  all  from  over-precipitation  and 
a  run  to  ruin. 

Ashurst  T.  Gilbert  was  one  of  the  Peel  Bishops.  He  had 
been  Principal  of  Brasenose  College  in  1822,  and  was  raised 
to  be  Bishop  of  Chichester  in  1842.  I  shall  have  to  speak 
later  of  his  harsh  treatment  of  John  Mason  Neale.  I  often 
saw  him  when  I  was  at  Hurstpierpoint,  and  he  struck  me  as 
hard  and  unsympathetic. 

Lord  John  Russell  was  Prime  Minister  from  July  6,  1846,  to 
February  27,  1852.  Lord  John  Russell's  convictions  in  matters 
religious  were  of  the  vaguest,  though  at  one  time  he  attended 

1  I  have  given  in  this  chapter  the  texts  Dr.  Littledale  considered 
applicable  to  the  bishops  of  his  time.  The  younger  clergy  to-day  know 
nothing  of  this  remarkable  man.  He  was  of  encyclopaedic  knowledge 
and  astounding  memory,  and  was  one  to  whom  it  was  possible  to  refer 
on  every  question  connected  with  Ecclesiastical  history  with  certainty 
of  enlightenment.  He  was  an  invalid,  and  obliged  to  lie  for  some  hours 
daily  on  his  back  ;  but  he  rarely,  if  ever,  missed  celebrating  early  and  daily 
at  a  sisterhood  hard  by  Red  Lion  Square,  where  he  occupied  a  flat.  He 
wrote  many  of  his  ablest  articles  in  the  Church  Times,  and  was  noted  for 
his  caustic  wit.  If  he  hit  hard,  it  was  at  abuses.  Actually  he  was  the 
most  tender-hearted  of  men.  Being  an  Irishman,  he  was  intensely  anti- 
Roman,  but  he  was  a  strong  Anglo-Catholic .    He  died  in  1890  (January  11). 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


177 


S.  Paul's,  Knightsbridge.  He  and  his  party  regarded  the  Church 
with  some  contempt,  and  would  have  been  not  unwilling  to  see 
her  shipwrecked.  They  did  their  best  to  bring  about  this  when 
they  nominated  to  be  captains  and  officers  of  the  vessel  men 
who  knew  nothing  of,  and  cared  less  for,  marinership. 

Lord  John's  appointments  were  mostly  bad.  That  of  Hamp- 
den to  Hereford  (1847)  was  done  to  outrage  the  feelings  of  the 
Church  party  at  Oxford.  For  Hampden  lay  under  censure 
of  heresy  by  his  University.  The  Archbishop  of  Canterbury 
(Howley)  and  the  Bishop  of  Ripon  (Longley)  wrote  in  conjunc- 
tion a  strong  letter  to  the  Premier  ;  and  a  "  Remonstrance  "  was 
signed  by  thirteen  bishops.  All  was  in  vain — Hampden  was 
appointed.  It  was  high  time  for  Churchmen  to  ask :  Is  the 
Church,  because  established,  to  be  overridden  by  the  State 
in  a  manner  that  no  sect  would  tolerate  ? 

Sumner  was  made  Archbishop  of  Canterbury.  He  was  a 
mere  nose  of  wax,  to  be  moulded  to  turn  up  or  turn  down,  to  be 
snub  or  bottle-shaped  as  the  Prime  Minister  fingered  him.  He 
supported  Mr.  Gorham  against  the  Bishop  of  Exeter,  and  insti- 
tuted him  into  his  living  in  defiance  of  his  own  bishop.  Sumner 
was  vehemently  denunciatory  of  the  Oxford  movement.  Hinds, 
on  the  recommendation  of  Archbishop  Whately,  whose  secre- 
tary he  had  been,  in  1849  was  given  the  bishopric  of  Norwich, 
which  he  resigned  in  1857  after  marrying  his  cook. 

Disraeli  took  off  Blomfield,  Bishop  of  London,  in  Tancred. 
"He  combined  a  great  talent  for  action  with  very  limited 
powers  of  thought.  Bustling,  energetic,  versatile,  gifted  with 
indomitable  perseverance,  and  stimulated  by  an  ambition  that 
knew  no  repose,  with  a  capacity  for  mastering  details,  and  an 
inordinate  passion  for  affairs,  he  could  permit  nothing  to  be 
done  without  his  interference,  and  consequently  was  perpetually 
involved  in  transactions  which  were  either  failures  or  blunders. 
He  was  one  of  those  leaders  who  are  not  guides.  Having  little 
real  knowledge,  and  not  endowed  with  those  high  qualities  of 
intellect  which  permit  their  possessor  to  generalize  the  details 
afforded  by  study  and  experience,  and  so  deduce  rules  of  conduct, 
his  Lordship,  when  he  received  those  frequent  appeals  which 
were  the  necessary  consequence  of  his  official  life,  became  obscure, 
confused,  contradictory,  inconsistent  and  illogical.  The  oracle 
was  always  dark.  Placed  in  a  high  post  in  an  age  of  political 
analysis,  the  hustling  intermeddler  was  unable  to  supply  society 
with  a  single  solution.    Enunciating  second-hand,  with  char- 


178 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


acteristic  precipitation,  some  big  principle  in  vogue,  as  if  he 
were  a  discoverer,  he  invariably  shrank  from  its  subsequent 
application  the  moment  that  he  found  it  might  be  unpopular 
and  inconvenient.  All  his  quandaries  terminated  in  the  same 
catastrophe — a  compromise.  Abstract  principle  with  him  ever 
ended  in  concrete  expediency.  The  primordial  tenet,  which  had 
been  advocated  with  uncompromising  arrogance,  gently  subsided 
into  some  second-rate  measure  recommended  with  all  the  artifice 
of  an  impenetrable  ambiguity.  The  Bishop,  always  ready,  had 
in  the  course  of  his  episcopal  career  placed  himself  at  the  head 
of  every  movement  in  the  Church  which  others  had  originated, 
and  had  as  regularly  withdrawn  at  the  right  moment,  when 
the  heat  was  over,  or  had  become,  on  the  contrary,  excessive. 
Furiously  evangelical,  soberly  high  and  dry,  and  fervently 
Puseyite,  each  phase  of  his  faith  concludes  with  what  the 
Spaniards  term  a  transaction." 

Utcumque  in  alto  ventus  est,  Epidice,  exin  velum  vortitur. 

Plaut.,  Epidic.  i.  i. 

Disraeli's  portrait  is  unfair.  Blomfield  was  indeed  "  infirm  of 
purpose,"  but  he  did  really  good  work.  In  1836  he  issued  an 
appeal  for  funds  to  build  fifty  new  churches  in  London,  which 
met  with  remarkable  success.  "But  it  was  reserved  to  him 
to  eclipse  all  his  services  to  the  Church,  and  to  surpass  even 
his  scheme  for  providing  the  population  of  London  with  adequate 
church  accommodation,  by  calling  attention  to  the  fact  that 
in  our  rapidly  extending  Colonies  we  were  either  spreading  an 
unavowed  but  most  real  Presbyterianism,  or  giving  over  these 
rising  countries  to  actual  infidelity.  When  he  made  his  appeal, 
the  foreign  dominions  of  the  British  Empire  had  only  nine 
Bishops  of  the  Anglican  succession,  of  whom  seven  were  wholly 
or  mainly  dependent  on  grants  by  the  State.  Although  Bishop 
Blomfield  had  to  combat  in  the  mass  many  and  numerous  objec- 
tions, he  was  permitted  to  see  the  practical  accomplishment  of 
his  scheme  ;  it  was  on  Whitsun  Tuesday,  1841,  that  the  Arch- 
bishops and  Bishops  sent  forth  the  declaration  which  launched 
the  Colonial  Bishoprics  Fund,  and  before  the  year  ended  Bishop 
Selwyn  was  on  his  way  to  New  Zealand,  and  in  one  day  five 
Bishops  for  Colonial  sees  were  consecrated  in  Westminster 
Abbey."  But  he  had  his  faults.  No  party  in  the  Church  could 
trust  him.  Trusting  to  him  was  like  Israel  relying  on  Egypt, 
"  on  which,  if  a  man  lean,  it  will  go  into  his  hand  and  pierce 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


179 


it."  But  with  all  his  weaknesses  Blomfield  did  a  great  work 
and  was  an  active  prelate.1 

At  S.  Barnabas,  Pimlico,  Blomfield  forbade  the  Invocation 
before  the  sermon.  "  If  you  don't  say  a  collect,  and  don't  say 
it  west,  I  will  withdraw  your  licence,"  he  said  to  the  curate 
in  charge.  Referring  to  a  metal  cross  on  the  retable,  he  said  : 
"  If  it  cost  me  my  see,  I  will  have  that  cross  removed."  Again, 
in  1852,  he  forbade  the  placing  of  flowers  on  any  occasion  upon 
the  Altar.  Blomfield  seems  to  have  treated  the  Church  accord- 
ing to  the  order  of  the  boatswain  in  the  Tempest:  "  Lay  her 
a-hold,  a-hold  ;  set  her  two  courses." 

To  return  to  the  prelates  nominated  by  Lord  John  Russell. 
Tancred  had  cried  out,  "  I  want  to  see  an  angel  at  Manchester  " 
■ — and  Lee  was  appointed.  Musgrave  was  made  Archbishop 
of  York  in  1847,  translated  thither  from  Hereford  ;  he  was  a 
strong  Evangelical  and  opposed  the  restoration  of  Convocation. 
He  was  the  son  of  a  Cambridge  tailor,  a  man  of  very  limited 
intelligence.  He  advanced  his  brother  Charles  to  be  Archdeacon 
of  Craven.  His  motto  was  Quieta  non  movere,  and  he  opposed 
the  revival  of  any  sort  of  deliberative  action  among  the  clergy 
of  the  Archdiocese.  Like  Strepsiades  in  The  Clouds  he  might 
have  said :  "  Well,  as  it  is  the  fashion,  let  us  snore  cosily 
wrapped  up." 

Lord  Palmerston  became  Prime  Minister  on  February  10, 
1855,  and  remained  in  power  till  February  25,  1858  ;  but  he 
was  again  Prime  Minister  June  18,  1859,  and  remained  so  till 
November  6,  1865,  when  Lord  John — created  Earl  Russell,  was 
again  in  power  till  July  6,  1866.  On  December  28,  1852,  Lord 
Aberdeen  became  Prime  Minister,  till  February  10,  1855.  He 
nominated  Lord  Auckland  to  the  see  of  Bath  and  Wells  in  1854, 
John  Jackson  to  Lincoln  in  1855,  Hamilton  to  Salisbury  in  1854 — 
an  admirable  appointment. 

"  Conscious  as  I  am,"  said  Bishop  Hamilton  in  a  charge  to 
his  clergy,  "  of  many  grave  faults  of  character,  I  am  not  conscious 
of  being  a  coward  in  the  avowal  of  my  principles.  I  have  never 
concealed  from  anyone  that  I  am  what  is  called  a  High  Church- 

1  Sydney  Smith's  opinion  of  him  was  not  so  different  :  "  The  Bishop 
of  London  is  passionately  fond  of  labour,  has  certainly  no  aversion  to 
power,  is  of  a  quick  temper,  great  ability,  thoroughly  versed  in  ecclesiastical 
law,  and  always  in  London.  When  the  Church  of  England  is  mentioned 
it  will  only  mean  Charles  James  of  London,  who  will  enjoy  greater  power 
than  has  ever  been  possessed  by  any  Churchman  since  the  days  of  Laud, 
and  will  become  the  Church  of  England  here  upon  earth." — First  Letter  to 
Archdeacon  Singleton. 


180 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


man.  I  was  not  so  when  I  was  ordained,  but  I  became  so  many 
years  before  I  was  Canon  of  Salisbury ;  and  when  I  declare  that 
I  number  this  change  among  the  many  mercies  which  I  have 
received  from  my  God,  I  can  truly  say  that  these  my  adoptive 
principles  have  ever  made  me  the  more  anxious  never  to  bear 
false  witness  against  others,  and  that  instead  of  drying  up,  they 
have  cherished  in  my  heart  a  spirit  of  charity  towards  those 
who,  whether  in  our  Church  or  beyond  its  limits,  are  in  some 
matters  not  one  with  me," 

Powys  was  sent  to  Sodor  and  Man  in  1854.  The  late  Dr. 
Littledale  gave  this  text  for  Powys  :  "  Man  being  in  honour 
hath  no  understanding,"  which  was  appropriate  enough. 

John  Jackson  was  a  shy  man,  with  a  somewhat  awkward 
manner  ;  when  at  Stoke  Newington  he  did  a  good  work,  before 
he  went  to  S.  James's,  Piccadilly.  He  was  a  staunch  friend  of 
The  Universities'  Mission  in  Central  Africa,  and  he  ordained 
Edward  Steere,  afterwards  Bishop  of  Zanzibar,  although  he  had 
been  rejected  by  Phillpotts,  Bishop  of  Exeter,  as  not  being  a 
graduate  of  Oxford  or  Cambridge.  He  was,  as  Bishop,  especially 
when  moved  in  1869  to  London,  too  much  under  the  influence 
of  Archbishop  Tait.  He  was,  however,  a  tolerant  man,  and 
maintained  throughout  an  affectionate  intercourse  with  Robert 
Brett  of  Stoke  Newington,  whose  worth  he  could  well  appreciate, 
though  in  Church  matters  not  seeing  eye  to  eye.  He  had 
a  story — whether  of  his  own  wife  or  not,  I  cannot  say.  The 
lady,  a  bishop's  wife,  complained  of  the  psalm  :  "  Old  men  and 
maidens,  young  men  and  children,  praise  the  name  of  the  Lord," 
that  there  was  no  invitation  to  old  ladies  to  join  in  the  chorus. 
"  My  dear,"  said  the  Bishop,  "  you  forget :  there  is  a  call  to  '  Ye 
dragons  and  all  deeps.'  "  His  text  was  appropriate  :  "  Giving 
no  offence  to  any  man,  that  the  ministry  be  not  blamed." 

Lord  Palmerston  was  a  very  Gallio  in  religious  matters,  and 
he  allowed  his  kinsman,  Lord  Shaftesbury,  to  recommend 
nullities  for  the  vacant  mitres.  The  Hon.  Charles  Baring,  brother 
of  Lord  Northbrook,  a  prejudiced  Evangelical,  Chaplain -in- 
ordinary to  Queen  Victoria,  was  appointed  to  the  see  of  Gloucester 
and  Bristol  in  1856,  and  advanced  to  Durham  in  1861.  "  Bless 
thee,  Bottom,  bless  thee,  thou  art  translated."  In  the  diocese 
he  was  by  the  clergy  variously  called  Overbearing  and  Past- 
bearing.  In  1867  he  deprived  the  Hon.  F.  R.  Grey,  Rector  of 
Morpeth,  of  the  office  of  Rural  Dean  for  the  offence  of  wearing 
a  black  stole  with  three  gold  crosses  embroidered  on  it,  and  for 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


181 


using  the  Invocation  before  the  sermon.  How  he  dealt  with 
Dr.  Dykes  shall  be  told  elsewhere,  and  here  again  the  grievance 
was  a  stole — but  this  time  coloured.  For  some  such  reason 
he  turned  the  Rev.  C.  J.  Naters  out  of  Trimdon,  where  he  was 
locum  tenens.  His  angry  warfare  against  stoles  caused  Dr. 
Littledale  to  give  as  his  text :  "A  prey  of  divers  colours,  a 
prey  of  divers  colours  of  needlework  on  both  sides,  meet  for  the 
necks."  Some  verses  relative  to  Bishop  Baring  passed  from 
hand  to  hand  in  the  diocese : 

"  Since  Shaftesbury  Durham's  latest  Bishop  chose, 
Leading  the  Dean  and  Chapter  by  the  nose, 
Each  high-bred  horse  attached  to  Charles's  Wain 
Has  plunged  impatient  of  the  bearing-rein. 

Great  Bear  inquires  if  such  high-mettled  steeds 
Are  just  the  cattle  suited  to  his  needs  : 
And  vows  no  stall  shall  feed  high-stepping  nag, 
To  kick  o'er  traces  and  upset  the  drag. 

Henceforth  regnante  Carolo,  each  cleric 
O'er  Cuthbert's  lands,  from  Darlington  to  Berwick, 
Shall  dare  no  pace,  but  crawl  and  creep  and  shuffle, 
Xor  neigh,  but  sniff  with  Puritanic  snuffle." 

Hitherto  from  the  time  of  the  reconstitution  of  the  chapter  in 
the  time  of  Charles  II  it  had  been  the  custom  for  the  Canons  to 
bow  to  the  Altar  on  entering  and  on  leaving  their  stalls  ;  but 
those  Canons  nominated  by  Baring  refused  compliance  with 
the  traditional  usage.  So  opposed  was  he  to  all  signs  of  corporate 
life  in  the  Church  that  he  declined  to  attend  the  first  Pan- 
Anglican  Congress  in  1867. 

The  Rev.  F.  Arnold,  in  his  book  on  Our  Bishops  and  Deans, 
employs  the  whitewash  brush  copiously,  but  he  is  constrained  to 
say  of  Bishop  Baring  :  "  One  of  the  grave  defects  of  our  present 
laws  is  that  the  Bishop  possesses  a  tyrannical  power  over  the 
curates  of  his  diocese,  whom  he  can  dismiss  and  inhibit  without 
any  cause  shown,  by  a  wave  of  the  hand  and  stroke  of  the  pen. 
This  power  is  generally  allowed  to  lie  dormant,  but  it  is  at  any 
time  liable  to  be  exercised  in  a  vindictive  and  indiscreet  way. 
Unsatisfied  by  the  immense  power  he  possesses,  the  Bishop  has 
aimed  at  its  expansion  by  demanding  written  pledges  both 
from  incumbent  and  curate,  which  they  are  unable  to  give.  The 
Bishop  then  lays  the  parish  under  an  interdict,  refusing  the  aid 
it  urgently  requires,  and  coolly  remarking  1  that  it  is  almost 


182 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


invariably  the  result  of  any  transgression  of  the  law  that  the 
innocent  are  involved  in  the  consequences,  and  often  suffer  more 
severely  than  the  offender/  "  I  shall  give  an  instance  of  his 
dealing  in  this  way  in  another  chapter. 

Bishop  Harold  Browne  was  at  one  time  incumbent  of 
S.  Sidwell's,  Exeter.  He  was  appointed  to  Ely  in  1864,  and  trans- 
lated to  Winchester  in  1873.  His  appointment  to  Ely  was  by 
Lord  Palmerston,  who  felt  that  the  partisan  nominees  of  Lord 
Shaftesbury  were  too  numerous,  and  the  quality  too  poor  ;  and 
that  he  must  placate  moderate  men  by  the  appointment  of  one 
who  was  a  scholar  and  not  in  any  way  extreme. 

Harold  Browne's  great  work  was  that  on  the  Thirty-nine 
Articles,  and  it  was  characterized  by  judgment  and  fairness. 
The  Bishop  sympathised  warmly  with  the  Old  Catholics,  and 
attended  the  Bonn  Conference.  He  wrote  to  the  Bishop  of 
Melbourne  :  "I  call  myself  an  old-fashioned  English  Churchman, 
and  I  find  more  to  repel  me  in  any  one  of  the  extreme  schools  in 
England  than  I  do  in  anything  I  have  seen  or  heard  of  the  Old 
Catholics.  Now  I  do  not  wish  to  expel  from  my  own  communion 
any  of  the  adherents  of  the  three  schools  within  it.  The  Church 
ought  to  hold  them  all,  or  it  will  become  a  sect." 

Thomson  was  given  Gloucester  and  Bristol  when  that  see 
was  vacated  by  Baring,  but  he  was  advanced  to  the  arch- 
bishopric of  York  in  1862,  after  he  had  been  Bishop  of  Gloucester 
and  Bristol  for  ten  months  only.  He  was  a  very  able  man,  one 
of  the  few  shrewd  men  of  the  party,  and  there  can  be  little  doubt 
that  his  rapid  promotion  was  mainly  due  to  the  desire  of  Lord 
Shaftesbury  to  have  a  strong  man  in  the  North  to  tread  out  the 
sparks  of  Catholic  teaching  and  worship  that  had  already  been 
kindled  there.  A  characteristic  entry  in  the  Diary  of  Bishop 
Wilberforce,  May  27,  1873,  is  to  this  effect  :  "  Dinner  at  Arch- 
bishop of  York's.  A  good  many  Bishops,  both  of  England  and 
Ireland,  and  not  one  word  said  which  implied  we  were  apostles. 
Eheu,  eheu,  very  low."1 

In  May  1868  appeared  the  second  Report  of  the  Ritual  Com- 
mission, relative  to  the  use  of  lighted  candles  on  the  altar  at 

1  A  story  was  told  of  him,  that  when  walking  one  day  with  the  Bishop 
of  Oxford,  he  remarked  on  the  coincidence  in  his  family  affairs  with  his 
advancements.  How  his  marriage  coincided  with  the  year  of  his  ordina- 
tion, and  each  baby  as  it  arrived  marked  as  well  a  step  higher  in  the 
Church.  "It  is  devoutly  to  be  hoped,  Archbishop,  that  Mrs.  Thomson 
will  stop  having  more."  "Why  so  ?  "  inquired  the  Archbishop,  flushing 
angrily.  "  Because  there  are  only  two  steps  more  that  you  could  mount — 
Canterbury  or  Heaven.    And  you  are  not  fit  for  either." 


ARCHIUSHOP  THOMSON 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


183 


the  Holy  Communion.  There  were  two  lawyers  who  contended 
that  they  were  lawful,  two  that  they  were  not.  The  Archbishop 
of  York  gave  the  casting  vote  against  them. 

When  Thomson  was  Bishop  of  Gloucester  he  opposed  in 
Convocation  the  purpose  of  Bishop  Gray  to  consecrate  a  bishop 
for  the  Orange  Free  State.  The  Bishop  of  Oxford  thereupon  ad- 
ministered a  well-deserved  dressing,  observing  that  "  when  they 
were  taking  into  consideration  so  important  a  matter,  to  treat 
it  with  contumely,  or  to  try  to  induce  others  to  do  so,  was  not 
the  conduct  which  a  brother  who  had  joined  in  prayer  to  God 
for  guidance  to  them  in  their  deliberations  should  pursue,"  and 
Bishop  Thomson's  resolutions  and  amendments  were  negatived 
without  discussion,  one  after  another,  and  the  diocese  of 
Bloemfontein  was  founded. 

Thomson  was  succeeded  in  Gloucester  and  Bristol  by  Ellicott, 
who  was  at  first  hostile  to  the  Church  revival.  He  was  a  good 
Greek  scholar,  and  wrote  Commentaries  on  the  Pauline  Epistles, 
and  acted  on  that  ill-fated  Revision  of  the  Bible.  He  was  a 
small  man  with  a  long  nose.  The  High- Church  programme  he 
did  not  understand,  nor  that  it  was  historically  connected  with 
the  past — and  the  best  past — of  the  Church  of  England.1 

To  Carlisle  Villiers  was  appointed — an  Evangelical,  and  one 
who  opposed  Convocation,  and  voted  for  the  Divorce  Bill.  He 
was  translated  to  Durham  in  i860.  He  was  not  there  very  long ; 
long  enough,  however,  to  appoint  his  son-in-law,  named  Cheese, 
to  one  of  the  best  livings  in  his  gift  :  Houghton-le-Skerne,  worth 
£1,300  per  annum.  This  provoked  a  cartoon  in  Punch.  A  poor 
needy  parson  is  by  a  table,  whereon  stands  a  Stilton  cheese, 
and  the  Bishop  is  decanting  over  it  a  bottle  of  port,  labelled 
£1,300,  and  saying  :  "I  am  exceedingly  sorry,  dear  brother  in 
the  Church,  but  you  see  I  have  not  a  drop  for  you,  I  have  poured 
it  all  into  my  Cheese."  It  is  said  that  this  cartoon  so  wounded 
Bishop  Villiers  that  it  led  to  his  death. 

After  the  appearance  of  this  picture,  the  bishops  became 
more  cautious  in  their  nepotism.  They  took  care  to  shuffle 
their  cards.  They  did  not  give  their  "  fat  "  livings  to  their 
own  relations,  but  to  the  sons  and  sons-in-law  of  other  bishops, 

1  Bishop  Wilberforce  notes  of  him  when  on  the  Ritual  Commission: 
"  Bishop  of  Gloucester,  as  always,  now  hot  and  intemperate  in  trying  to 
force  on  condemnation  of  vestments.  I  said  the  Church  of  England 
was  the  church  of  liberty.  The  Bishop  of  Gloucester  :  1  Let  them  go  to 
Rome  ;  why  not  ?  A  very  good  communion — next  best  to  ours.'  "  Life, 
iii.  216. 


184 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


who  acknowledged  the  favour  by  accommodating  those  of  the 
obliging  archbishop  or  bishop  in  their  more  distant  dioceses. 

Villiers  was  succeeded  in  Carlisle  in  i860  by  Samuel  Walde- 
grave,  another  strong  Evangelical,  who  opposed  surpliced  choirs 
and  harvest  thanksgivings.  In  1868  he  refused  to  be  at  a  stone- 
laying  because  there  was  to  be  a  harvest  thanksgiving  associated 
with  it,  and  not  only  did  so  himself,  but  wrote  round  to  some  of 
the  clergy  in  the  neighbourhood  to  dissuade  them  from  attending. 

"  To  introduce  choral  services,  and  as  it  would  seem  surpliced 
processions  into  our  mountain  valleys,  is,  to  say  the  least,  an 
innovation.  To  do  so  in  direct  contravention  of  the  well-known 
opinions  and  wishes  of  the  Bishop,  to  whom  you  have  sworn 
obedience,  is  something  more.  If  that  choral  service  is  accom- 
panied by  any  peculiar  ceremonies,  even  in  a  modified  degree, 
of  harvest  celebrations  such  as  have  recently  occupied  so  much 
public  attention,  the  matter  is  still  worse."  Thus  wrote  the 
Bishop  to  the  Rev.  E.  Shuttlebotham  of  Woodland.  The  Rector 
replied  that  what  he  had  sworn  was  to  yield  canonical  obedience, 
not  to  obey  every  private  fancy  of  the  Bishop. 

"  It  appears  that  a  copy  of  your  Lordship's  letter  to  me  was 
sent  to  Mr.  Robinson  1  with  a  request  that  he  would  make  the 
contents  of  it  known,  and  prevent  all  whom  he  could  influence 
from  attending  the  service  to  be  held  at  Woodland  to-day. 
Mr.  R.,  on  opening  the  letter  and  finding  it  addressed  to  myself, 
thinking  it  an  original  one,  at  once  sent  it  on  to  me  by  his  servant. 
It  seems,  then,  your  Lordship,  not  content  with  administering  a 
severe  rebuke,  without  waiting  to  give  me  an  opportunity  of 
saying  a  word  in  my  own  defence,  without  even  making  against 
me  any  specific  charge,  had  determined  that  my  castigation 
should  be  made  public,  and  that,  if  possible,  a  prejudice  should 
be  raised  against  me  in  this  neighbourhood.  I  must  respectfully 
but  firmly  protest  against  such  treatment.' ' 

John  Thomas  Pelham — "  the  Butler,"  as  he  was  nicknamed 
in  his  diocese — was  given  the  bishopric  of  Norwich  in  1857, 
after  the  scandal  of  Samuel  Hinds  ;  he  was  an  old-fashioned 
Evangelical.  In  1872  he  had  the  frankness  to  admit  that,  after 
so  many  years  under  his  pastoral  charge,  in  every  particular 
denoting  practical  work  and  spiritual  zeal,  his  diocese  had  not 
merely  stood  still,  but  had  actually  gone  back,  save  that  there 
were  not  quite  so  many  churches  where  was  only  one  service  on 

1  The  Bishop  wrote  to  other  clergy  in  the  same  way  that  he  did  to  Mr. 
Robinson. 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


185 


Sundays  as  there  had  been  a  decade  ago.  And  it  may  be  asserted 
with  confidence  that  whenever  in  one  of  these  dioceses  there 
was  any  progress  at  all,  it  was  in  no  way  due  to  the  Bishop, 
and  that  where  it  manifested  itself  it  was  hampered  by  him. 
Dr.  Littledale's  text  for  Pelham  was  :  "  I  am  a  fool  for  Christ's 
sake."  There  is  this  to  be  said  for  Bishop  Pelham,  that  he  ad- 
vocated an  increase  of  the  Episcopate,  having  found  his  diocese 
unwieldy.  He  was  prepared  to  sacrifice  a  good  slice  of  the 
receipts  for  the  proposed  see  if  he  could  obtain  a  division  of  that 
of  Norwich,  He  advocated  the  creation  of  eight  new  sees,  and 
the  reduction  of  the  incomes  of  the  then  existing  bishops,  so 
that  each  of  the  prelates  of  these  new  sees  might  have  £3,000 
a  year  apiece. 

Mr.  Swinburne  in  his  delightful  book,  Memories  of  a  School 
Inspector,1  has  a  story  of  a  certain  bishop  whose  name  he  does 
not  give,  nor  where  was  his  see.  When  this  prelate  was  very 
old,  and  the  diocese  was  getting  thoroughly  tired  of  him  and 
wishing  for  a  successor,  he  visited  for  the  first  time  a  well-known 
country  rector,  who  by  his  zeal  and  benevolence  had  won  the 
hearts  of  his  parishioners.  He  had  likewise  spent  very  lavishly 
of  his  private  means  on  church  and  schools.  The  living  was 
good  and  in  the  gift  of  the  bishop,  and  his  lordship  had  either 
a  relation  or  a  toady  to  whom  he  desired  to  present  it. 

Almost  his  first  remark  to  the  rector  as  he  drove  up  was — 
"  Don't  you  think  it  high  time  that  another  should  enjoy  this 
living  ?  Wouldn't  it  be  better  for  the  people  ?  "  Be  it  noted 
that  this  parson  was  twenty  years  younger  than  the  bishop. 

On  reaching  the  church  his  lordship  began  to  pray  extempore, 
intimating  to  Almighty  God  that  the  time  had  come  for  the 
"  Spirit  of  the  Lord  to  permit  his  brother  to  entertain  the  idea 
of  making  way  for  a  successor."  The  rector  listened  in  dismay. 
Then  the  prayer  went  on  :  "  And  that  not  my  brother  only,  but  I, 
too,  should  do  my  duty."  Now,  thought  the  rector,  he  is  coming 
to  the  point — he  is  referring  to  his  own  retirement.  Not  a  bit 
of  it.  The  bishop  proceeded  :  "  Put  it  into  my  heart,  O  Lord, 
to  find  him  a  good  successor." 

After  that,  it  need  hardly  be  said,  the  rector  did  not  see  his 
way  to  resignation. 

It  was  Bishop  Pelham  who  is  reported  to  have  once  told  his 
congregation  that  "  England  was  an  island  entirely  surrounded 
by  water." 

1  P.  33.    Published  by  McDougall,  191 1.    Price  2s.  6d. 


186 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Selwyn  was  Bishop  of  Lichfield  from  1867  to  1878,  after  having 
done  noble  work  as  Bishop  in  New  Zealand. 

He  saw  clearly  that  the  Colonial  Churches  must  be  inde- 
pendent, an  idea  abhorrent  to  the  Erastian  party  in  England; 
and  he  had  the  boldness  to  ignore  the  hesitations  and  timidity 
of  the  English  Bishops,  and  the  difficulties  raised  by  the  lawyers, 
and  motu  proprio  to  get  suffragan  bishops  ordained  for  the 
dioceses  he  constituted  in  New  Zealand,  without  troubling  to 
refer  home  for  legal  permission. 

At  the  Wolverhampton  Church  Congress,  when  expatiating 
on  the  independence  claimed  by  the  Colonial  Churches,  Lord 
Harrowby  interrupted  him  by  saying,  "  You  have  cut  the 
painter."  At  once  Bishop  Selwyn  retorted  :  "  No  !  we  have 
not  cut  the  painter  ;  it  has  parted  of  itself,  and  we  are  now 
forging  a  more  enduring  cable,  like  the  invisible  and  immaterial 
bonds  that  anchor  the  planets  to  the  sun." 

His  best  powers  had  been  exhausted  in  the  Colony,  and  he 
was  out  of  touch  with,  and  did  not  understand  the  problems 
that  demanded  solution  in  the  Mother  Church  at  home.  Con- 
sequently, knowing  what  his  abilities  were,  and  how  skilfully  he 
had  organized  the  Church  in  New  Zealand,  his  tenure  of  the  see 
of  Lichfield  was  somewhat  of  a  disappointment. 

Francis  Jeune  was  given  the  bishopric  of  Peterborough  in 
1864.  He  had  been  made  Dean  of  Lincoln  by  Palmerston,  but 
vacated  the  deanery  for  the  palace  of  Peterborough  the  same 
year.  He  was  a  determined  opponent  at  Oxford  of  Dr.  Pusey 
and  the  writers  of  the  Tracts  for  the  Times.  At  Oxford,  Liddell, 
Dean  of  Christ  church,  Thomson,  afterwards  Archbishop  of  York, 
and  Jeune,  Master  of  Pembroke,  were  fast  friends,  and  were 
often  seen  walking  together.  They  went  by  the  nicknames  of 
the  World,  the  Flesh  and  the  Devil.  One  day  Miss  Jeune  was  in 
High  Street  with  a  friend,  when  they  saw  the  three  strutting 
along  the  pavement  together.  "  Oh  !  "  said  Miss  Jeune,  "  here 
come  the  World  and  the  Flesh."  "And  the  other  carries  his 
designation  in  his  face,"  added  the  friend.  Jeune  was  a  re- 
markably ugly  man.  Jeune  was  high  in  favour  with  the  Prince 
Consort.  His  text  was  :  "I  will  run  after  this  man  (the  Prince) 
and  take  something  of  him."  Jeune  belonged  to  a  Huguenot 
family  settled  in  Jersey.1  His  eldest  son,  Chancellor  of  eight 
dioceses,  Judge  in  Probate  and  Divorce,  and  then  Judge  Advocate 
General,  was  created  Baron  St.  Helier.  The  Bishop  refused  to 
attend  the  Pan- Anglican  Conference  of  1867. 

1  See  what  has  been  said,  p.  146. 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


187 


Worcester  was  accorded  to  Philpot,  Master  of  S.  Catherine's 
College,  Cambridge,  a  nest  of  Low  Churchmen.  He  sent  the 
case  of  the  Rev.  R.  W.  Enraght,  Vicar  of  Holy  Trinity,  Bordesley, 
to  be  tried  by  Lord  Penzance  on  the  usual  charges.  Special 
stress  was  laid  upon  the  use  of  wafer  bread,  and  a  sacrilegious 
and  ignorant  man  was  bribed  by  the  Birmingham  Protestants 
to  go  up  to  Communion  and  secrete  the  Blessed  Sacrament.  It 
was  taken  into  Lord  Penzance's  Court  as  an  "  exhibit  "  to  be 
used  in  evidence  at  Mr.  Enraght's  trial.  Strong  and  indignant 
feeling  at  this  outrage  was  wide  extended,  and  Bishop  Philpot 
was  appealed  to,  as  Mr.  Enraght's  diocesan,  to  put  a  stop  to 
the  scandal,  but  he  did  nothing.  He  hardly  ever  attended  the 
House  of  Lords,  never  the  Upper  House  of  Convocation,  and 
refused  to  permit  diocesan  conferences.  After  floating  as  King 
Log  in  his  see  from  1861  to  1890,  he  resigned. 

J.  S.  Perowne,  of  Huguenot  extraction,  of  a  family  settled 
at  Norwich  on  the  revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes,  and  in- 
heriting Huguenot  misbeliefs,  was  made  Dean  of  Peterborough. 
At  a  Church  Conference,  and  again  in  a  pamphlet,  he  disputed 
the  divine  and  apostolic  origin  of  Episcopacy,  and  advocated  the 
recognition  of  the  orders  in  various  Protestant  sects.  For  this 
he  was  patted  on  the  back  by  Drs.  Parker  and  Clifford,  and 
belauded  by  the  whole  Liberationist  press. 

In  reward  for  his  liberality  of  opinion  he  was  given  the 
bishopric  of  Worcester  in  1890.  At  his  consecration  he  was 
asked :  "  Are  you  ready,  with  all  faithful  diligence,  to  banish 
and  drive  away  all  erroneous  and  strange  doctrine  contrary 
to  God's  Word  ?  "  And  he  made  answer  :  "I  am  ready,  the 
Lord  being  my  helper."  Whereupon  he  was  consecrated.  He 
had  in  his  diocese  the  Rev.  C.  E.  Beeby,  Vicar  of  Yardley  Wood, 
near  Birmingham,  who  published  in  Creed  and  Life  (1898),  and 
afterwards  in  Doctrine  and  Principles  (1900),  his  denial  of  the 
verities  of  the  Christian  Creed,  the  doctrine  of  the  Holy  Trinity, 
the  Virginal  Birth,  the  Divinity  of  Christ,  the  Atonement,  and 
the  facts  of  the  Resurrection  and  the  Ascension.  Of  the  first 
of  these  books,  the  Bishop  said  that  it  was  "  an  honest  attempt 
to  deal  with  great  spiritual  problems,"  but  added  that  he 
disapproved  of  parts.  He  took  no  steps  against  Mr.  Beeby. 
Again  in  1903  did  Mr.  Beeby  write  against  the  Virginal  Birth, 
in  the  Hibbert  Journal.  The  Bishop  allowed  him  to  go  on  in 
his  parish  teaching  the  coarsest  heresy.  Did  he  ever  read,  in 
Ezekiel,  the  sentence  of  God — "  I  will  even  deal  with  thee,  as 


188 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


thou  hast  done,  which  hast  despised  the  oath,  in  breaking  the 
covenant  ?  " 

Rochester  was  given  to  an  Evangelical — Wigram,  1860-1867. 
He  visited  portions  of  the  diocese  that  had  never  seen  a  bishop 
previously.  He  was  a  good  man,  but  left  no  mark  in  the  see  ; 
he  was  known  for  little  else  than  as  the  author  of  a  Practical 
Elementary  Arithmetic,  1832.  Of  most  of  these  Shaftesbury- 
Palmerston  bishops  in  their  sees,  one  might  say  with  Puck : 
"  What  hempen  homespuns  have  we  swaggering  here  ?  " 

Thorold  was  created  Bishop  of  Rochester  in  1877,  the  appoint- 
ment being  made  by  Lord  Beaconsfield.  Later,  in  1890,  he  was 
accorded  the  bishopric  of  Winchester  by  the  Marquess  of 
Salisbury.  He  was  an  Evangelical  of  little  mental  capacity, 
but  of  intense  earnestness,  that  showed  when  he  spoke.  He 
started  on  his  episcopal  career  with  the  determination  to 
ostracize  all  Catholics,  but  he  soon  found  out  his  mistake,  for 
they  were  the  best,  hardest,  and  most  successful  workers  in  his 
diocese,  whereas  the  most  prominent  of  the  Evangelical  clergy 
did  practically  no  parish  work.  And,  as  Thorold  had  a  high 
opinion  of  work,  he  changed  his  policy.  His  son  went  over  to 
Rome,  and  became  a  monk.  Strange  to  say,  this  made  the 
father  better  disposed  towards  High  Churchmen  than  before. 
He  was  an  earnest  little  man,  very  much  alive  to  his  own 
importance,  and  willing  latterly  to  recognize  merit  wherever  he 
saw  it. 

After  holding  himself  aloof  from  churches  that  were  in  the 
hands  of  advanced  Churchmen,  he  was  at  last  hesitatingly 
induced  to  hold  Confirmations  at  S.  Stephen's,  Lewisham,  and 
S.  John's,  Kennington  ;  and  afterwards  said  that  he  had  never 
witnessed  such  reverent  order  and  such  devotion,  and  that  he 
found  he  had  made  a  great  mistake  in  his  previous  judgment. 

Thorold  had  been  reared  in  the  straitest  school  of  Evangeli- 
calism by  an  adoring  widowed  mother  and  two  elder  sisters 
of  somewhat  morbid  piety.  To  save  him  from  contamination 
from  the  "  world,"  he  was  not  sent  to  a  public  school ;  and  at 
Oxford  he  obtained  no  higher  distinction  than  an  honorary 
fourth  in  mathematics.  As  incumbent  of  S.  Giles-in-the-Fields 
he  did  well.  From  S.  Giles  he  moved  to  S.  Pancras  in  1869, 
and  was  given  a  canonry  at  York  by  Archbishop  Thomson. 
His  own  private  means  were  ample,  and  his  duties  at  S.  Pancras 
well  paid.  He  was  nominated  by  Lord  Beaconsfield  to  the  see 
of  Rochester  in  1877,  which  he  accepted  without  the  faintest 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


189 


whisper  of  Nolo  episcopari,  for  from  childhood  he  had  enter- 
tained the  highest  opinion  of  his  own  abilities  to  discharge  any 
duty  and  fill  any  post  offered  him.  A  reviewer  of  his  Life  by 
C.  H.  Simkinson  wrote  :  "  There  is  something  which  jars  on  our 
sense  of  congruity  in  the  late  occupant  of  a  diocese  whose  neces- 
sities were  so  overwhelming  as  those  of  South  London,  spending 
large  sums  upon  decoration  and  furniture  of  the  castle  (Farnham) 
in  which  the  successors  of  William  of  Wykeham  were  housed. 
The  symmetry  of  a  life  of  high  and  noble  effort  is  marred  by 
the  undue  appreciation  in  which  the  Bishop  evidently  held  ■  the 
pomp  of  circumstance,'  and  its  dignity  is  lowered  as  we  read 
of  lavish  outlay  upon  flower-beds  and  hanging  gardens,  upon 
Japanese  wall-papers  and  costly  tapestries.  ...  In  an  age 
wherein  extravagance  and  luxury  trench  so  forcibly  on  wealth 
that  should  be  devoted  to  higher  uses,  simplicity  of  living  and 
disregard  of  outward  show  are  imperative  in  those  who  bear 
rule  in  the  Church." 

Only  less  luxurious  was  Bishop  Thorold's  setting  at  Selsdon 
Park  when  Bishop  of  Rochester,  where  his  "  splendid  hospi- 
tality inevitably  suggested  at  times  a  painful  contrast  with  the 
position  of  the  poorer  clergy  struggling  in  the  thickest  of  the 
light."  He  was  notably  successful  as  a  beggar  for  diocesan 
needs. 

And  yet  of  Thorold  this  may  be  said.  It  was  he  who  appealed 
to  the  Universities  to  establish  Missions  in  the  south  of  London ; 
and  the  Cambridge  and  Oxford  Houses  in  those  parts  have  had 
noble  results.  Many  a  young  man  has  been  brought  thereby 
face  to  face  with  the  miseries  and  the  godlessness  of  those  be- 
nighted regions,  and  has  learned  what  it  is  to  labour  for  souls. 

Archibald  Campbell  Tait,  born  in  Edinburgh  of  Scottish 
Presbyterian  parents,  was  given  the  bishopric  of  London  in 
1856.  When  at  Balliol  he  had  been  leader  of  the  attack  on 
Tract  Ninety  ;  he  had  been  made  Dean  of  Carlisle  in  1849,  but 
neither  understood  nor  sympathized  with  Cathedral  worship 
and  order.  When  in  1856  he  lost  five  little  daughters  through 
an  outbreak  of  scarlet  fever,  Queen  Victoria,  to  solace  his  paternal 
feelings,  got  Lord  Palmerston  to  nominate  him  to  the  see  of 
London.  From  first  to  last  he  was  greatly  influenced  by  his 
early  Presbyterianism.  He  was  not  a  Calvinist,  he  was  on  the 
contrary  a  Latitudinarian  ;  and  he  was  mentally  and  spiritually  in- 
capable of  understanding  and  appreciating  the  Anglican  position, 
as  distinct  from  that  of  any  Established  form  of  Protestantism  in 


190  THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 

Germany  or  Switzerland.  His  sympathies  throughout  his  career 
were  with  Presbyterianism.  Definitions  of  the  verities  of  the 
Faith  he  disliked ;  and  he  had  vague  ideas  as  to  what  the  Sacra- 
ments were.  From  first  to  last  he  supposed  that  it  was  his  mission 
to  oppose  the  Catholic  revival.  He  persecuted  Mr.  Liddell  of 
S.  Paul's,  Knightsbridge,  for  having  a  stone  altar  ;  he  withdrew 
the  licence  of  the  Rev.  A.  Poole  because  he  heard  confessions. 
Evangelicals  he  favoured,  not  because  he  held  their  principles, 
but  because  they  gave  no  trouble  by  insisting  on  unpopular 
doctrines.  The  men  with  whom  he  really  sympathized  were 
the  Broad  Churchmen,  and  such  as  believed  in  the  Church  as  a 
State  creation  appointed  to  teach  only  what  the  State  desired 
to  have  taught,  and  to  act  only  as  the  State  bade  them  act.  He 
was  consistently  hostile  to  all  such  as  believed  in  the  Church 
as  a  spiritual  society,  with  her  own  laws  and  spiritual  powers. 
He  voted  for  the  Divorce  Act,  and  he  encouraged  Bishop 
Colenso.  There  was  always  a  puzzled,  dissatisfied  expression 
on  his  face,  like  that  of  a  schoolboy  set  to  work  out  a  problem 
beyond  his  capacity.  When  he  preached  the  Consecration  sermon 
at  All  Saints',  Margaret  Street,  he  refrained  from  the  least 
expression  of  sympathy  with,  or  congratulation  on,  the  energy, 
the  self-sacrifice  and  devotion  of  the  heart  to  God  which  had 
raised  that  noble  and  sumptuous  pile,  merely  coldly  remarking 
that  he  hoped  the  church  might  prove  "  a  fresh  help  to  those 
whose  tastes  it  gratifies."  1 

It  was  the  clergy  of  S.  Michael's,  Shoreditch.  wearing  coloured 
stoles,  that  he  is  reported  to  have  rudely  ordered  :  "  Take  away 
those  ribbons."  2  Of  his  treatment  or  rather  neglect  of  dealing 
with  the  troubles  in  the  S.  George's-in-the-East  riots,  something 
shall  be  said  in  another  chapter. 

Bishop  Wilberforce  felt  deeply  the  cold  and  repellent  attitude 
adopted  by  Bishop  Tait  towards  the  advanced  clergy.  He 
wrote  in  1856,  concerning  Father  Lowder's  mission  in  London 
Docks:  "  I  quite  long  to  go  and  cast  myself  into  that  mission. 
It  must  depend  on  the  men  in  high  places  at  any  one  moment 
whether  the  work  prospers  or  not.  It  is,  I  mean,  not  the  Church 

1  There  is  this  to  be  said  for  Archbishop  Tait,  that,  finding  what  a 
scandal  was  caused  by  the  sacrilegious  production  in  Court  of  a  conse- 
crated wafer  at  the  trial  of  Mr.  Enraght,  he  obtained  it  and  reverently 
consumed  it  in  his  own  chapel. 

3  Mr.  Mackonochie  and  Mr.  Lowder  declared  that  this  was  a  fiction  of 
Dr.  F.  G.  Lee — they  never  heard  the  Bishop  say  this.  Dr.  Lee's  imagina- 
tion sometimes  ran  away  with  him,  and  the  story  was,  I  understand, 
traced  to  him. 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


191 


of  England,  but  the  men  who  are  on  their  trial.  The  Church  has 
enough  life,  but  evils  may  bring  the  wrong  man  to  the  top  ;  if 
only  now  we  had  a  Bishop  of  London  who  would  go  and  spend 
a  day  or  two  in  Wapping  and  gain  the  full  trust  of  these  zealous 
men,  what  might  we  not  do  ?  " 

Bishop  Tait's  system  of  patronage  provoked  a  good  deal  of 
comment.  Even  such  an  adulator  as  the  Rev.  F.  Arnold,  who 
lays  on  his  praise  of  the  bishops  with  a  trowel,  says  :  "  He  is  a 
man  who  always  takes  care  of  friends.  Chaplain  after  chaplain 
has  been  made  bishop,  or  has  had  a  bishopric  offered  to  him. 
Livings  have  been  distributed  to  all  within  the  charmed  circle. 
He  not  only  takes  care  of  his  friends,  but  of  his  friends'  friends. 
Sometimes  he  puts  round  pegs  into  square  holes,  and  square 
pegs  into  round  holes  ;  as  when  he  sent  men  of  severe  learning 
and  retired,  studious  habits,  into  the  incumbencies  of  vast  poor 
parishes,  as  the  readiest  means  of  providing  for  them.  .  .  . 
We  are  not  aware  of  any  instances  in  which  the  Archbishop  has 
sought  out  any  scholar  of  eminence,  or  curate  of  prolonged 
services,  unless  a  popular  cry  or  powerful  interest  has  been 
brought  to  bear  on  the  selection." 

The  Erastianism  of  Tait  when  Bishop  of  London  was  never 
more  conspicuously  marked  than  in  a  debate  in  the  House  of 
Lords  in  1867,  on  the  Colonial  Church,  when  he  showed  in  his 
speech  that  he  thought  the  Colonial  Church,  though  not  estab- 
lished by  law,  should  be  reduced  under  the  supremacy  of  the 
Crown,  so  that  appeals  in  ecclesiastical  causes  would  be  heard 
in  the  same  manner  as  English  appeals.  To  this  Bishop  Wilber- 
force  retorted:  "It  should  be  remembered  that  the  Church  of 
England  in  the  Colonies  is  a  purely  voluntary  body,  like  the 
Wesleyans  or  any  other  body  of  religionists  having  an  internal 
regulation  of  its  own,  but  having  no  connection  with  the  Crown 
except  as  subjects  of  the  Queen. " 

Tait's  words  in  an  Episcopal  Council  in  1858  on  Missionary 
Bishops  were  :  "  Bishops  in  Roman  Catholic  countries  were 
sent  by  the  Pope  ;  in  our  country  the  bishops  should  be  sent 
by  the  Queen,  who  stood  in  the  same  place  as  the  Pope.  The 
State,  and  our  connection  with  it,  was  our  greatest  blessing, 
and  there  would  be  great  danger  to  the  Church  in  injuring  our 
connection  with  it.  The  same  result  might  be  obtained  by 
dividing  the  existing  dioceses  and  giving  them  the  superinten- 
dence of  their  missions,  and  then  the  Queen  would  come  in. 
After  all,  is  the  measure  desirable  ?    Is  there  any  accuracy  of 


192 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


data  for  supposing  that  bishops  are  of  any  use  ?  Surely  it 
is  better,  if  you  have  bishops,  to  have  them  backed  up  by  the 
State."  1 

Early  in  1874  the  Bishops  met  and  determined  that  a  Bill 
for  enforcing  discipline  in  ritual  matters  must  be  pushed  forward, 
and  the  conduct  of  this  Bill  through  Parliament  was  committed 
to  Archbishop  Tait.  It  was  read  a  second  time  in  the  House 
of  Lords,  but  when  it  came  into  committee  it  was  met  with 
a  flood  of  amendments.  The  most  important  of  these  were 
introduced  by  Lord  Shaftesbury.  They  virtually  destroyed  the 
Court  of  Arches,  and  in  its  place  set  up  an  entirely  new  tribunal, 
wholly  secular  and  lay.  The  Archbishop  was  determined  to 
legislate  at  all  costs,  and  when  he  found  that  he  could  not  rely 
upon  Churchmen  of  any  school  to  secure  the  passing  of  the  Bill 
which  the  Bishops  had  proposed,  he  supported  that  of  Lord 
Shaftesbury.  It  was  then  that  Dr.  Littledale  applied  to  him  the 
text,  "  Take  thy  bill  and  sit  down  quickly." 

He  had  already,  in  1868,  been  appointed  by  Lord  Beacons- 
field  to  the  see  of  Canterbury.  Facts  have  conclusively  shown 
that  the  Act,  so  far  from  appeasing  strife,  tended  to  aggravate 
it,  whilst  it  inflicted  the  additional  grievance  on  the  clergy  that 
it  invented  a  Court  in  which  they  felt  that  they  could  not 
even  defend  themselves  without  being  disloyal  to  the  Church 
of  which  they  were  ministers. 

After  1878  his  health  began  to  fail,  and  towards  the  end  of 
1882  he  took  to  his  bed,  and  there  attempted  to  undo  some 
of  the  mischief  which  he  had  accomplished.  He  persuaded  Mr. 
Mackonochie  to  resign  the  benefice  of  S.  Alban's,  Holborn,  so  as 
to  avert  prosecution  by  the  Church  Association.  He  felt  in 
a  vague  way  that  he  might  have  done  wrong  throughout  his 
episcopate,  and  had  the  courage  to  admit  the  possibility,  so 
that  finally  he  may  have  felt,  like  Saul  of  Tarsus,  "It  is  hard 
for  thee  to  kick  against  the  pricks." 

Robert  Bickersteth,  another  of  the  Palmerston-Shaftesbury 
appointments,  was  sent  to  Ripon,  an  important  see  comprising 
within  it  the  manufacturing  towns  of  Leeds,  Bradford,  Wake- 

1  Bishop  Wilberforce  wrote  to  Gladstone,  November  6,  1861  :  "The 
Bishop  of  London,  who  professes  to  disbelieve  in  the  power  of  Episcopacy 
apart  from  Prelacy,  has  constantly  opposed  every  attempt  we  have  made 
to  extend  our  missionary  episcopate,  and  has  sought  to  bind  our  poor 
Church  in  new  fetters."  The  day  was  named  for  the  consecration  of  the 
Bishop  of  Honolulu  by  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  and  Bishops  of 
Chichester  and  Oxford,  when  the  Bishop  of  London  interfered  and  got  it 
postponed  sine  die. 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


193 


field,  Dewsbury,  Huddersfield,  Halifax,  Barnsley — in  fact,  all 
the  great  teeming  manufacturing  portion  of  Yorkshire,  leaving 
to  the  archbishopric  only  Sheffield  of  this  busy,  thriving  and 
thickly  populated  region.  What  was  needed,  and  needed  im- 
periously, was  an  able,  active  ruler,  full  of  energy  and  organizing 
capacity.  Bickersteth  was  none  of  this.  His  proper  sphere 
would  have  been  a  proprietary  chapel  in  Cheltenham  or  Bath. 
A  severe,  but  not  unjust  critique  was  passed  on  the  fulsome  and 
undiscriminating  panegyric  passed  on  him  by  his  son,  in  the 
Church  Quarterly  Review,  No.  48  (1887).  He  occupied  the  throne 
of  Ripon  from  1856  to  1884. 1  He  was  a  narrow  Evangelical ;  he 
voted  for  the  Divorce  Bill  and  for  marriage  with  a  deceased 
wife's  sister.  I  shall  have  more  to  say  of  him  presently,  as  I 
was  in  his  diocese  from  1864  to  1866.  He  was  a  sincerely  pious 
man,  desirous  of  doing  what  was  right  as  far  as  his  lights  went, 
but  those  lights  illumined  but  a  very  small  radius. 

It  cannot  be  said  that  the  bishops  nominated  by  Lord  Beacons- 
field  were  a  great  improvement  on  the  nonentities  of  the  Palmer- 
ston-Shaftesbury  appointment,  with  the  notable  exception  of 
Lightfoot  to  Durham.  Magee  was  a  witty,  fluent,  Irish  popular 
preacher  and  platform  orator.  He  came  to  England  frankly  to 
push  his  fortunes.  He  wrote :  "  I  confess  that  a  presumptuous 
dream  I  had  of  doing  good  in  the  Irish  Church  by  raising  a 
standard  of  liberality  and  moderation  in  theology  and  politics 
is  dissipated  by  an  experience  of  five  years.  ...  I  am  a  speaker 
only,  and  cannot  bring  myself  to  howl  in  Ireland  after  the 
fashion  approved  by  Irish  Churchmen."  He  took  the  pro- 
prietary "  Octagon  "  Church  at  Bath,  and  thence  was  promoted 
to  be  Dean  of  Cork.  Next  he  was  given  the  see  of  Peter- 
borough by  Disraeli  because  he  made  a  brilliant  speech  against 
the  Disestablishment  of  the  Irish  Church.  As  Bishop  he  was 
active  in  his  diocese,  but — as  he  said — he  picked  out  the  High 
Churchmen  and  threw  them  over  the  hedge  into  his  neigh- 
bour's garden.  A  great  work  of  Church  extension  and  levelling 
up  of  Church  life  and  practice  was  accomplished  in  the  large 
towns  of  Northampton  and  Leicester  in  his  time,  but  how  far 
he  had  a  hand  in  this  is  hard  to  determine.  The  Bishop 
was  wont  to  come  and  take  up  his  abode  in  Northampton 

1  Bishop  Wilberforce  in  his  Diary,  May  15,  1858,  wrote:  "Discussion 
at  S.P.G.  on  Missionary  Bishops.  A  painful  occasion.  Carlisle  and 
Ripon  utterly  disbelieving  in  Christ's  appointment  (of  Episcopacy).  Alas  ! 
alas  !  Lord  forgive  them — they  know  not  what  they  do." 

13 


194 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


for  two  or  three  weeks  together,  living  in  rooms,  where  he 
was  accessible  to  the  clergy  at  any  time.  This  he  did  also  in 
other  parts  of  his  diocese.  In  1891  he  was  promoted  to  the 
Archbishopric  of  York  by  the  Marquess  of  Salisbury,  but  he 
died  shortly  after. 

Disraeli  had  accurately  defined  the  procedure  of  his  pre- 
decessors as  Prime  Ministers  in  the  choice  of  bishops  :  "  Find 
a  man  who,  totally  destitute  of  genius,  possesses  nevertheless 
considerable  talents ;  who  has  official  aptitude,  a  volubility 
of  routine  rhetoric  ;  who,  embarrassed  neither  by  the  principles 
of  the  philosopher  nor  by  the  prejudices  of  the  bigot,  can  assume 
with  a  cautious  facility  the  prevalent  tone,  and  disembarrass  him- 
self of  it  with  a  dexterous  ambiguity  the  moment  it  ceases  to  be 
predominant — such  a  man,  though  he  be  one  of  an  essentially 
small  mind,  though  his  intellectual  qualities  be  less  than  moderate, 
with  feeble  powers  of  thought,  no  imagination,  contracted 
sympathies — such  a  man  is  the  individual  whom  kings  and 
parliaments  would  select  ...  to  rule  the  Church." 

Such  being  Disraeli's  judgment  of  the  appointments  by 
previous  Prime  Ministers,  one  might  have  expected  that  he 
would  be  conscientious  and  judicious  in  such  matters.  But  the 
catching  of  votes  stood  with  him  above  principle  ;  and  to  please 
the  Evangelicals  Lord  Beaconsfield  advanced  to  episcopal  thrones 
men  of  ultra-low  opinions.  One  would  almost  think  that 
Disraeli  was  playing  the  prank  of  the  lord  in  the  Induction  to 
Taming  the  Shrew,  when  he  took  up  these  individuals  who  knew 
nothing  of  Church  doctrine  and  Church  order,  and  had  them 
conveyed  into  episcopal  palaces,  vested  them  in  lawn,  and  got 
them  addressed  as  "  My  Lord." 

Am  I  a  lord  ? 
Or  do  I  dream,  or  have  I  dream'd  till  now  ? 
I  do  not  sleep  ;  I  see,  I  hear,  I  speak  ; 
I  smell  sweet  savours,  and  I  feel  soft  things  ; 
Upon  my  life,  I  am  a  lord  indeed, 
And  not  a  tinker,  not  Christopher  Sly, 
Well,  bring  our  lady  (our  diocese)  hither  to  our  sight, 
And  once  again,  a  pot  o'  the  smallest  ale. 

Ryle  was  appointed  to  the  newly-created  see  of  Liverpool.  It 
was  he  who  persecuted  Mr.  Bell-Cox  of  S.  Margaret's,  Liverpool, 
and  had  him  sent  to  prison.  Ryle  had  himself  been  a  member  of 
the  Church  Association,  called  into  being  to  prosecute  High 
Churchmen,  so  that  he  was  quite  ready,  like  Herod,  "  to  vex 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


195 


certain  of  the  Church."  Ryle  was  the  author  of  a  book  entitled 
Knots  Untied,  published  under  the  auspices  of  the  National 
Protestant  Church  Union.  He  untied  knots  only  to  produce 
a  tangle.  The  book  teems  with  theological  misconceptions  and 
unproven  assertions.  It  was  issued  as  a  sort  of  text-book  of 
Protestantism  in  the  Church  of  England.  He  counsels  laymen 
to  forsake  their  parish  churches  if  the  clergy  do  not  preach 
"  the  Gospel  "  as  he  understood  it.  But  two  can  play  at  that 
game.  He  urged  "  lawsuits  wherever  there  is  a  reasonable  hope 
of  success."  And  this  was  the  sort  of  man  that  the  Prime 
Minister  planted  in  the  Church.  Did  that  half-reclaimed  Jew 
do  so  out  of  mockery  ?  1 

When  one  considers  Ryle's  bigotry,  his  narrow  partisanship, 
his  treatment  of  the  parish  of  S.  Margaret's,  and  his  obtaining 
the  imprisonment  of  Mr.  Bell-Cox — the  text  applied  to  him  does 
not  seem  inappropriate  :  "  Where  shall  wisdom  be  found  ?  and 
where  is  the  place  of  understanding  ?  The  sea  (read  see)  saith, 
It  is  not  in  me."  There  is,  however,  something  to  be  said  for 
Bishop  Ryle,  that  towards  the  end  of  his  life  he  softened  con- 
siderably, and,  probably  because  he  was  heartily  ashamed  of 
what  he  had  done  to  the  Vicar  of  S.  Margaret's,  he  went  out 
of  his  way  to  be  gracious  to  Mr.  Bell-Cox.  As  that  priest 
said  in  a  letter  to  me,  "  his  kindness  and  confidence  were  most 
touching."  It  speaks  highly  for  Ryle's  character,  that  he  was 
ready  by  act,  though  not  by  words,  to  admit  that  he  had  done 
wrong. 

More  than  that,  too  many  of  the  Evangelical  clergy  in  his 
diocese,  whom  he  had  at  first  favoured,  he  discovered  to  be 
men  of  words  and  not  of  deeds,  and  that  the  work  for  souls, 
the  reclaiming  of  the  fallen,  and  the  building  up  in  the  faith  and 
in  the  love  of  God,  and  to  a  spiritual  life,  was  effected  by  the 
clergy  working  upon  Catholic  lines.  He  was  large-hearted  enough 
to  recognize  this.  No  ordinary  man  could  have  done  so.  And 
he  changed  his  conduct  towards  them.  It  is  evidence  of  his 
genuine  sincerity  and  humility  of  spirit  that  he  did  this.  And 
as  one  of  his  clergy  said  to  me  :  "  He  came  here  as  Saul  the 
persecutor,  and  became  to  us  Paul  the  Apostle." 

James  Fraser  was  offered  by  Gladstone  and  accepted  the 
bishopric  of  Manchester,  because  he  had  worked  as  Assistant 
Commissioner  to  the  Education  Commission  in  1858.    He  became 

1  Bishop  Wilberforce  wrote  in  1867  of  Disraeli  :  "Not  a  bit  a  Briton 
but  all  over  an  Eastern  Jew." 


196  THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 

bishop  in  1870.  He  was  hard-working,  and  had  no  "  side."  He 
is  described  as  "  striding  about  his  diocese  on  foot,  carrying  his 
own  blue  bag  containing  his  robes,  stopping  runaway  carts"1 — 
that  is  to  say  he  did  so  once — "  and  talking  familiarly  with 
every  one  he  met."  In  fact  he  would  talk  to  any  one  who  would 
listen  to  him  ;  he  was  garrulous  to  an  extreme. 

Of  Fraser  might  be  said,  as  of  Gratiano :  He  "  speaks  an  in- 
finite deal  of  nothing.  His  reasons  are  as  two  grains  of  wheat 
hid  in  two  bushels  of  chaff :  you  may  still  seek  all  day  ere  you 
find  them,  and  when  you  have  them,  they  are  not  worth  the 
search."  His  most  grievous  blunder  was  in  not  vetoing  the 
Miles  Platting  case,  and  in  approving  the  consequent  imprison- 
ment of  the  Rector.  He  received  a  severe  castigation  in  the 
Northern  Convocation  from  Dean  Lake  and  Canon  Owen. 

But  if  Bishop  Fraser  took  an  unfortunate  line  in  the  matter 
of  S.  John's,  Miles  Platting,  he  behaved  with  great  firmness  in 
the  case  of  S.  John's,  Cheetham  Hill,  in  1884.  The  benefice  was 
in  the  Bishop's  gift,  and  became  vacant  by  the  resignation  of 
Mr.  Lund,  who  had  a  young  Mr.  Gunton  as  his  curate.  A 
memorial  signed  by  upwards  of  1,800  parishioners  requested  the 
Bishop  to  present  this  curate  to  the  living.  A  great  many  of 
the  subscribers  were  Dissenters.  But  Bishop  Fraser  had  sight 
of  a  sermon  and  paper  and  letter  by  Mr.  Gunton,  in  which  he 
expressed  so  distinctly  his  Socinian  views,  and  spoke  of  Christ 
as  man  "  differing  only  in  degree  from  ourselves,"  that  he 
refused  to  institute  him ;  remaining  unmoved  amidst  the 
vituperations  of  the  press  and  of  speakers  at  indignation 
meetings,  and  taunts  that  he  had  always  advocated  that  the 
parishioners  should  have  a  voice  in  the  nomination  of  their 
priest — and  now  that  the  voice  had  spoken  emphatically,  he 
would  not  listen  to  it. 

Mr.  Swinburne  describes  a  school-opening  he  attended :  "I 
myself  heard  him  speak — when  introducing  a  deputation  he 
took  up  three-quarters  of  the  hour  allotted  to  that  person  whom 
people  had  come  from  miles  to  hear.  His  lordship  was  there  to 
speak  on  Education,  but  he  opened  the  meeting  by  referring  to 
his  sisters  in  Christ :  '  My  sisters  in  Christ,  blessed  with  affluence 

1  It  was,  I  have  been  told,  a  very  small  affair.  A  boy  was  delivering 
parcels  from  a  little  tradesman's  cart,  and  leaving  it  to  give  up  one,  the 
horse  or  pony  trotted  or  cantered  off  without  the  driver.  Bishop  Fraser 
easily  stopped  it,  and  gave  the  reins  to  the  lad  who  was  running  after. 
The  most  was  made  of  this — and,  as  may  be  seen  by  the  quotation  above, 
the  one  incident  is  swelled  to  many. 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


197 


in  my  old  parish ' — here  a  digression  occurred  to  contest  the 
views  expressed  by  certain  smiles  among  his  audience,  that 
the  expression  '  sisters  in  Christ  '  was  open  to  objections.  The 
next  digression  went  to  prove  that  the  opinion  of  his  1  sisters 
in  Christ  blessed  with  affluence '  curiously  coincided  with  the 
rougher  materials  not  so  blessed,  to  whom  it  had  been  his  privilege 
to  minister  in  mining  districts,  and  that  characteristic  was — 
breathless  anxiety  on  the  part  of  his  audience  to  hear  it — but 
several  more  digressions  ensued  before  our  curiosity  was  allayed, 
and  we  learnt  that  his  sisters  in  Christ  always  complimented  him 
on  '  going  straight  to  the  point,'  that  was  to  say  to  the  root 
of  the  matter ;  and  what  was  the  matter  before  them  ?  why 
Education. 

"Education,  he  informed  us,  was  a  Latin  word — yet  one 
more  digression  to  prove  the  utility  of  the  study  of  dead  lan- 
guages. This  digression  became  multiplied  in  the  shape  of 
reasons  why  his  audience,  chiefly  fisher-folk,  should  not  be  dis- 
couraged if  they  did  not  understand  Latin,  and  were  not  thus 
in  a  position  to  be  as  accurate  as  his  lordship ;  and  to  prove 
his  accuracy  he  proceeded  to  explain  to  them  what  that  word 
education  meant.  '  Education  comes  from  educo,  a  Latin  word 
meaning  "  I  build  up."'  "  1 

That  this  is  no  caricature  may  be  judged  by  Bishop  Fraser's 
address  to  the  working  men  at  the  Leeds  Congress  in  1872. 
Bishop  Wilberforce  thus  describes  it  in  a  letter  to  the  Rev. 
Hugh  Pearson,  October  10,  1872  :  "  Bishop  of  Manchester  starts 
by  saying  they  are  not  working  men — that  only  a  few  are  (cry  of 
'  Show  of  hands,'  and  75  per  cent,  hold  up  their  hands).  Tells 
a  good  story  of  his  squire  in  Berkshire,  who  told  him  that  he 
should  have  been  a  tippler  and  a  poacher — says  he,  but  having  a 
comfortable  house,  is  not  tempted  to  tipple  at  the  Black  Dog, 
and  smoke  churchwardens  (now  he  is  speaking  very  well  indeed) . 
Why  do  not  the  poor  hear  us  gladly  ?  Now  has  just  scalped 
poor  Gloucester  and  Bristol,  but  well  and  tenderly  as  if  he  loved 
him.  Now  he  is  praising  Mr.  Joseph  Arch.  Now  he  has  made 
a  great  blunder  :  says  '  the  order  of  the  Angel  was,  Go  stand  in 
the  Temple  and  speak  the  words  of  this  life.  We  don't  want 
heaven  and  paradise  10,000  years  hence,  but  what  is  to  help 
you  to-day  ?  '  The  Greek,  brother  Fraser,  won't  bear  it.  Now 
again,  he  is  very  good :  *  Do  you  read  your  Bibles  for  yourselves  ? 
Do  you  pray  ?  '  Now  he  is  speaking  very  mischievously,  ap- 
1  Swinburne  (A.  J.),  Memories  of  a  School  Inspector,  p.  52. 


198 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


pealing  to  the  Wesleyans  about  surplices,  etc.,  and  contrasting 
them  with  winning  living  souls  ;  and  so  he  stops,  applauded 
for  the  last  bit  of  mischief — leaving,  as  Lord  Nelson  said,  the 
impression  that  '  the  kingdom  of  God  is  not  meat  and  drink ' 
means  'there  are  no  sacraments'"  (Life  of  Bishop  Wilberforce, 
iii.  399). 

It  was  of  Bishop  Fraser  that  one  of  his  leading  incumbents 
remarked,  when  a  conference  was  convened  to  consider  by 
what  means  the  episcopal  hands  might  be  strengthened :  "  Alas  I  " 
with  a  sigh,  "it's  his  head  that  wants  strengthening." 

When  the  Indian  famine  occurred,  and  English  hearts  were 
stirred  with  compassion,  and  purses  were  opened  to  send  relief 
to  the  starving  natives,  Bishop  Fraser  did  his  utmost  to  dis- 
courage this  generous  sympathy,  on  the  plea  that  it  was  the 
business  of  the  State  to  relieve  the  distress. 

He  objected  to  house-to-house  visitation  by  the  clergy,  saying, 
"  It  will  be  done  mechanically,  and  I  do  not  believe  any  spiritual 
fruit  will  flow  from  it." 

At  the  Bath  Church  Congress  he  said :  "  When  I  heard  my 
Right  Rev.  brother,  the  Bishop  of  Chichester,  plead  for  a  life 
of  devotion,  I  hoped  that  the  word  '  devotion  '  might  be  meant  to 
include  devotion  to  duty  as  well  as  devotion  on  the  knees  in 
prayer,  for  we  bishops,  who  have  the  care  of  so  many  churches 
upon  us,  have  but  little  time  to  give  up  to  those  hours  of  prayer 
which  we  feel  we  do  most  earnestly  need."  It  would  have  been 
well  for  him  had  he  spent  more  time  on  his  knees,  and  less  in 
blathering  on  a  platform.  One  of  his  canons  remarked  after  his 
death,  that  he  seemed  to  be  much  more  interested  in  the  doings 
of  Dissenters  than  in  the  work  of  the  Church. 

A  highly  eulogistic  Life  has  been  written  of  Bishop  Fraser 
by  Mr.  Diggle,  now  Bishop  of  Carlisle ;  another  by  Mr.  Tom 
Hughes. 

There  was  a  surgeon  at  Wakefield  who,  when  riding  by  the 
workshop  of  a  sexton-stonecutter,  saw  that  the  man  had  wrongly 
spelled  an  inscription  on  a  monument.  "  Heigh  !  "  said  he, 
"you  have  made  a  blot  there."  "Never  mind,  Sir,"  replied 
the  man;  "cover  it  over.  I  have  covered  over  many  a  blot 
of  yours." 

And  what  biographies  may  be  written,  when  all  the  blots 
are  covered  over  ! 

The  story  is  told  of  Thackeray  that,  as  he  was  passing  a  fish- 
monger's shop,  before  which  stood  a  couple  of  barrels  of  oysters 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


199 


labelled  respectively  is.  a  dozen,  and  is.  3^.  a  dozen,  he  re- 
marked to  a  companion,  "  How  the  shilling  bivalves  must  hate 
those  at  one-and-three  !  "  But  one  would  say  rather,  "  How  they 
must  fear  them  !  "  Small  beer  would  never  suffer  Bass's  pale  ale 
to  be  advanced  to  table  till  it  had  stood  and  become  unpalatably 
flat.    It  is  alarmed  at  the  energy  and  effervescence  of  the  latter. 

According  to  Sir  Francis  Younghusband,  who  made  the 
memorable  march  to  Lhassa :  "  It  is  not  the  ordinary  man, 
however  much  he  may  develop  his  mediocrity,  that  is  most 
wanted.  It  is  the  exceptional  man.  It  is  the  man  with  just 
that  touch  which  we  cannot  positively  define,  but  which  we  all 
instinctively  recognize  as  genius.  There  is  a  superabundance  of 
ordinary  men,  and  it  must  be  admitted  that  they  do  ordinary 
work  very  much  better  than  geniuses.  But  it  is  the  genius  alone 
who,  when  the  occasion  arises,  will  flash  a  ray  through  the  masses 
of  ordinary  men,  and  make  them  do  what  they  would  never  do 
with  any  amount  of  development  of  their  ordinary  qualities." 
Now  the  English  parsons  are  mostly  ordinary  men,  but  it  is 
precisely  among  such,  as  in  the  army,  that  genius  has  a  special 
work  to  do — to  illumine,  to  guide,  to  galvanize  into  activity.  But 
it  is  precisely  these  who  were  crushed  and  driven  away  by  the 
bishops,  and  who  had  no  chance  of  promotion,  no  prospect  of 
getting  a  living  from  the  Crown,  the  Chancellor,  or  any  public 
body.    From  among  the  mediocratics  the  bishops  were  chosen. 

The  Shaftesbury-Palmerstonian  bishops  as  little  resembled 
the  great  prelates  of  the  past,  Andrewes,  Laud,  Bull,  Butler, 
Pearson,  as  an  empty  coal-barge  in  a  sluggish  canal,  at  night, 
illumined  by  a  tallow  dip  in  a  dingy  lantern,  resembles  a  man-of- 
war  breasting  the  waves  in  dazzling  sunlight.  Both  are  vessels — 
that  is  all. 

These  bishops  and  deans  and  canons  who  owed  promotion 
to  their  Evangelical  opinions  were  good  men,  smug  and  plausible, 
but  not  scholars,  without  force  of  character,  and  power  to  com- 
prehend what  were  the  needs  of  the  Church  of  England. 

It  was  a  change  from  the  Peel  and  Russell  bishops  to  those 
of  Palmerston,  hardly  an  improvement. 

Aliter  catuli  longe  olent,  aliter  sues. 

Plautus. 

What  was  felt,  and  felt  bitterly  by  the  High-Church  clergy,  was 
how  completely  the  bishops  cringed  to  the  man  in  the  street. 
If  the  press  denounced  ritual,  confession,  high  doctrine,  they 


200 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


hastened  to  echo  the  same  in  their  charges.  I  venture  to  quote 
from  a  poem  that  passed  in  MS.  about  this  time.  It  was  entitled 
"  The  Marionette  Dancer."  A  strange  masked  piper  placed 
puppets  on  the  pavement  and  bade  them  caper  to  his  tune,  as 
he  worked  a  string  that  set  them  in  motion.  I  have  space  for 
but  a  few  lines. 

Then  he  held  up  with  a  contemptuous  yawn 

A  doll  in  rochet,  and  with  sleeves  of  lawn. 

"  This  one  I  got,  half-form'd,  from  one  whose  trade 

Was  making  saints  ;  but  this  aside  he  laid, 

For  how  a  saint,  he  asked,  be  fashioned 

With  knot  at  heart,  and  dry-rot  in  the  head  ? 

Rejected,  but  in  prelate's  vesture  set, 

He  makes  no  saint,  but  makes  a  marionette. 

Obedient  to  whatever  I  may  please, 

Bows,  cringes,  leers,  advances,  stands  at  ease, 

Opinions  taking  from  the  daily  papers, 

And  as  the  rabble  whistle,  feebly  capers." 

I  interrupted  him  and  said,  "  I  pray, 

Tell  me,  are  these  dolls  rattling  thus  all  day  ?  " 

He  answered  with  a  shrug  of  shoulder,  "  Aye  ! 

And  when  they're  broken,  out  of  joint,  and  fail 

To  please  the  mob,  then  of  no  more  avail, 

I  cast  them  in  yon  box." — The  box  was  black, 

Bearing  a  coffin -plate,  inscribed  Oblivion. 

Then,  I  would  move  away,  but  paused  awhile 

To  ask,  "  Strange  piper,  with  sardonic  smile, 

Winding  your  threads,  casting  your  dolls  away, 

With  fallen  mask,  tell  me  thy  name,  I  pray  ?  " 

He  raised  himself,  as  after  me  he  hurl'd 

The  answer  fiercely,  "  Sir  !  I  am  the  World." 

There  is  a  hackneyed  story  of  an  artist  painting  the  Assumption 
who  was  accorded  a  vision  of  cherubs.  "  Messieurs,  asseyez-vous 
s'il  vous  plait,"  said  he.  "  Helas,  mais  nous  n'avons  pas  de 
quoi !  "  they  replied.  These  Palmerstonian  bishops  reversed  the 
condition.  They  could  take  their  seats,  but  they  had  no  heads. 
It  is  not  angels  only  that  hover  over  us,  but  paper  kites  as  well. 

One  of  them  gave  a  lecture  on  Geology,  mainly  based  on 
Hugh  Miller's  Testimony  of  the  Rocks,  and  spoke  in  it  of  a  Megale- 
iherium,  whereupon  he  was  held  up  to  ridicule  by  the  Saturday 
Review.  This  same  bishop  went  to  a  Church  opening,  and  was 
handed  the  programme  of  the  service.  The  Benedictus  was  to 
be  sung.  "  Benedictus  !  Benedictus  i  "  he  exclaimed.  "  That  is 
something  Popish — I  will  not  allow  that." 

The  same  prelate  sent  for  one  of  his  incumbents,  and  took 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


201 


him  to  task  for  advertising  the  preaching  of  a  Mission  priest 
as  that  of  the  Rev.  Father  So-and-so.  "  It  is  unscriptural, 
it  is  against  the  Word  of  God,"  said  the  bishop,  quoting 
S.  Matthew  xxiii.  9,  "  Call  no  man  your  father,  etc."  "  But,  my 
Lord,"  replied  the  priest,  "  how  about  yourself  ?  Are  not  we 
to  address  you  as  the  Right  Reverend  Father  in  God  ?  "  The 
bishop  collapsed  at  once. 

For  awhile  these  bishops  clogged  the  wheels  of  the  Church. 
They  originated  nothing,  they  had  no  programme,  no  definite 
aims,  no  organizing  power.  Those  of  the  party  who  were  in 
Colonial  sees  were  conspicuous  failures.  Australia  was  a  dumping- 
ground  for  them,  and  in  no  Colony  did  the  Church  prove  so 
feeble.  These  Palmerstonian  prelates  have  happily  now  all 
dropped  away,  leaving  not  a  trace  behind,  save  volumes  of 
charges,  for  which  a  second-hand  bookseller  would  not  give 
sixpence  a  ton.  There  is  much  to  be  said  for  the  bishops  of  this 
period.  They  had  a  most  difficult  course  to  steer.  The  great 
bulk  of  the  people,  ignorant  and  prejudiced,  were  opposed  to  the 
Church  movement.  The  Court,  the  Press,  the  Lawyers  were 
against  it.  Unhappily,  with  the  exception  of  Bishop  Wilberforce, 
there  was  no  commanding  genius  among  them  with  a  wide 
outlook.  There  were  some  devout  and  orthodox  prelates,  but 
they  had  not  the  force  of  character  and  the  ability  to  stand  up 
for  the  cause  of  the  Church.  They  led  sweet  and  holy  lives — 
that  was  all.  The  majority  of  the  bishops  were  mediocrities, 
men  of  low  intelligence,  narrow  views,  and  hearts  quaking  before 
the  voice  of  the  press  and  the  shout  of  the  vulgar.  They  were, 
rightly  enough,  earnest  for  personal  religion,  but  they  had  no 
conception  of  anything  beyond  individualism.  They  were 
conscientious,  but  their  consciences  were  enclosed  within  a  hazel 
nutshell.  They  had  no  prophetic  outlook  into  the  future  ;  they 
had  no  scales  wherein  to  weigh  forces.  Canute  had  his  chair 
planted  on  the  sands,  and  bade  the  tide  respect  it.  It  did  not — 
it  rose  and  submerged  his  seat.  But  these  prelates  sat  on  their 
thrones  and  screamed  and  charged  against  the  tide  that  swelled 
and  which  they  were  powerless  to  control.  The  evil  was  due 
to  the  Prime  Ministers,  who  selected  for  bishops  men  who  were 
ignorant  of  steering  to  act  as  pilots  among  the  sandbanks  of  the 
day ;  men  who  had  no  knowledge  of  where  was  deep  water ; 
poor,  inept  blunderers  put  in  charge  of  the  vessel  of  Christ's 
Church,  who  ran  her  from  side  to  side,  groping  their  way,  devoid 
of  knowledge  and  not  even  understanding  the  compass. 


202 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


The  Colonial  sees  were  for  the  most  part  rilled  with  favourites 
of  the  Church  Missionary  Society,  and  with  home  nonentities. 
An  old  pupil  of  mine,  a  devout  Churchman,  went  to  Australia 
to  a  diocese  obsessed  by  one  of  these.  The  Bishop  invited  him 
to  supper.  The  meal  ended,  at  which  were  several  youths,  the 
company  resolved  itself  into  a  prayer-meeting  over  the  rinds  of 
cheese  and  the  dregs  of  home-made  ginger-beer.  The  Bishop 
tripped  about  asking  each  guest  to  "  put  up  a  prayer,"  and  giving 
each  his  cue.  My  pupil  turned  hot  and  cold,  and  when  his  turn 
came,  in  a  tremulous  voice  began  to  pray  for  a  blessing  to  descend 
"  on  the  Bishop  of  this  Diocese  and  on  his  wife — 1  Thou  who  hast 
promised  to  save  both  man  and  beast '  " — and  came  to  a  fright- 
ened stop.  In  the  dead  silence  that  ensued,  the  Bishop  pro- 
nounced a  sonorous  Amen.  Whereupon  Mrs.  Bishop  heaved  her 
head  above  the  chair  rail  and  flashed  a  threatening  glance  at  her 
spouse.    "  Amen  "  signifies  "  so  it  is,"  as  well  as  "  so  be  it." 

Mr.  H.  G.  Wells  in  Kipps  gives  a  very  true  picture  of  one  of 
these  men,  returned  to  England.  "  He  derived  much  help  from 
a  '  manly  '  sermon,  delivered  in  an  enormous  voice  by  a  large, 
fat,  sun-red  clergyman,  just  home  from  a  colonial  bishopric  he 
had  resigned  on  the  plea  of  ill-health,  exhorting  him  that  what- 
ever his  hand  found  to  do  he  was  to  do  it  with  all  his  might." 
These  men  were  incorrectly  termed  "  returned  empties." 
Empties  they  were  not,  for  they  were  full  of  pomposity  and 
self-complacency — at  least  such  were  some  of  those  that  I  came 
across. 

Happily  there  were  others,  notable  types  of  Colonial  and 
Missionary  bishops,  working  upon  definite  Church  lines. 

The  unhappy  thing  was  that  the  bishops,  with  the  exception 
of  a  very  few,  did  not  understand  the  movement,  as  the  necessary 
outcome  of  the  Catholic  seed  that  had  ever  been  in  the  English 
Church,  but  had  been  trampled  on,  overlaid  with  paving-stones, 
battered  down,  but  had  never  been  killed.  Much  excuse  must 
be  made  for  them.  With  regard  to  Archbishop  Tait,  though  he 
had  conformed  to  the  Church,  his  Scottish  training  left  a  de- 
cided influence  on  his  character  and  mind.  The  old  adage  is 
true  that  wine  evermore  retains  the  flavour  of  the  soil  in  which 
it  grows. 

A  gentleman  near  Whitby  holds  lands  on  a  singular  tenure. 
He  is  bound  once  in  the  year  to  mount  his  horse,  gallop  into 
the  sea,  and  drive  a  wattle  into  the  sand.  He  then  gallops  back, 
and  the  next  wave  washes  his  wattle  away.    The  Victorian 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


203 


bishops  were  much  like  that  gentleman.  They  supposed  that 
they  held  office  subject  to  the  condition  that  they  should  yearly 
ascend  their  hobbies,  make  a  dash  into  the  waves  of  religious 
conviction  rolling  up  from  the  depths  of  fervid  hearts,  and  plant 
their  petty  protests,  which  next  moment  would  be  cast  indignantly 
aside,  and  which  no  one  could  suppose  would  restrain  the  rising 
tide  which  swells  obedient  to  a  Divine  impulse. 

But  assuredly  these  prelates  should  have  endeavoured  to 
obtain  some  comprehension  of  the  principles  of  that  party 
against  which  they  levelled  all  their  batteries.  Whereas,  from 
their  own  description  of  it,  they  did  not  understand  it  at  all — 
they  never  even  attempted  to  understand  it.  There  was  one 
among  them  with  ability,  and  that  was  Thomson,  who  had 
Scottish  shrewdness.  But  the  movement  had  already  grown 
beyond  his  control.  A  man  once  put  his  foot  down  on  the 
bubbling  spring  which  was  the  source  of  the  Thames.  "  Now," 
said  he,  "  all  the  ships  and  barges  below  London  Bridge  will 
stick  in  the  mud."  Thomson  put  down  his  foot,  but  not  on  the 
spring,  and  the  water  overflowed  his  instep,  rose  above  his  knee. 

As  to  being  leaders,  the  bishops  appointed  by  Lord  Palmerston 
were  leaders  only  in  the  same  way  that  is  a  wheelbarrow  which 
the  man  in  the  street  thrusts  before  him. 

It  may  be  interesting  at  the  present  day  to  compare  the 
treatment  of  Ordinands  now  with  what  it  was  formerly.  Now 
most  of  the  bishops  gather  about  them  those  preparing  for  the 
ministry  not  merely  to  prove  their  knowledge,  but  to  kindle 
their  devotional  feelings.  They  are  kind  and  considerate,  and 
where  they  have  room,  lodge  them  in  their  palaces. 

An  old  friend  has  furnished  me  with  an  account  of  his  ordina- 
tion by  one  of  the  Shaftesbury-Palmerstonian  bishops  in  the 
sixties. 

"  The  vicar  of  X  desired  to  have  me  as  his  curate,  and  I  went 
to  town  by  appointment  and  called  on  the  bishop  in  the  morning 
at  his  lodgings,  whilst  breakfast  was  on  the  table,  at  the  hour 
fixed  by  himself.  It  did  not  occur  to  him  to  offer  me  even  a 
cup  of  coffee  or  a  bit  of  toast.  I  had  come  up  by  an  early  train 
from  a  distance,  to  meet  him  by  appointment,  and  had  had  no 
breakfast.  He  received  me  stiffly  and  ungraciously,  and  required 
me  to  go  to  his  cathedral  city  for  examination  for  the  ordination, 
that  was  to  take  place,  not  on  Trinity,  but  on  Whit-Sunday. 
The  candidates  were  expected  to  lodge  in  the  town  and  to 
walk  out  some  considerable  distance  in  the  morning  to  the 


204 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


palace,  where  examination  began  at  10  a.m.  At  noon  a  meagre 
refection  was  served  to  us,  ham-sandwiches  and  very  small  beer, 
in  the  hall,  of  which  we  partook  standing.  Meanwhile  lunch  was 
being  carried  into  the  dining-room  for  his  Lordship,  chaplains 
and  family  ;  and  whilst  they  were  feeding,  the  butler  intimated 
to  us  that  we  were  expected  to  walk  about  the  grounds.  This 
we  did,  and  heard  the  clatter  of  knives  and  forks  in  the  dining- 
room. 

"  At  length  we  were  suffered  to  return  into  the  palace,  when 
the  comestibles  had  been  carried  from  the  dining-room  in  which 
we  were  examined,  but  from  which  the  smell  of  the  meal  had 
not  been  dissipated. 

"  Nothing  could  have  been  set  more  unsuitable  for  drawing 
out  the  knowledge  of  a  candidate  than  the  papers  we  were 
required  to  answer.  They  were  keys  to  taps  from  which  might 
flow  a  stream  of  unctuous  twaddle.  Our  principal  examiner  was 
a  man  considered  a  burning  and  shining  light  of  the  Evangelical 
school,  if  that  can  be  called  a  school  where  there  is  no  scholarship. 

"  The  man  who  was  supposed  to  have  passed  best,  and  was 
set  to  read  the  Gospel  on  the  Sunday,  he  was  a  literate,  who 
dropped  every  '  h,'  but  could  write  sheets  of  pious  vapourings. 
In  conversation  with  him  afterwards  I  learned  that  he  could 
spell  out  Greek  words,  but  knew  little  or  no  Latin.  Yet  this 
windbag  had  the  audacity,  on  entering  his  curacy,  to  publish  the 
very  first  sermon  he  preached.  It  was  an  impertinence  of  the 
Bishop  to  distinguish  such  a  man  above  the  heads  of  Oxford  and 
Cambridge  men,  some  already  Masters  of  Arts. 

"We  were  ordained  in  the  private  chapel  of  the  palace  robed 
in  black  gowns,  and  the  Bishop  preached  empty  nothingnesses 
to  us  for  an  hour.  After  that,  we  were  invited  to  lunch  with 
him." 

I  was  in  the  diocese  of  Ripon  under  Bishop  Bickersteth  from 
1864  to  1866.  He  was  so  unsympathetic  that  he  was  called  in 
the  diocese  "  the  Bleak  Bishop."  He  was  wont  to  give  copies  of 
Simeon's  Skeletons  of  Sermons  or  Clayton's  Sermons,  which  had 
no  sale,  to  all  candidates  for  Holy  Orders  in  his  diocese.  Richard 
Collins,  afterwards  of  S.  Saviour's,  Leeds,  said  to  him :  "  My 
Lord,  I  venture  to  ask,  with  the  prophet :  Can  these  dry  bones 
live  ?  Do  you  know,  my  Lord,  what  the  Dean  [Erskine]  has 
said  of  Simeon's  Skeletons  ?  "  "  No,  Mr.  Collins ;  I  should  be 
very  glad  and  interested  to  learn  his  opinion."  "  Well,  my 
Lord,"  he  said,  "  '  You  might  as  well  expect  results  from  them  as 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


205 


you  might  look  for  an  oak-tree  to  grow  out  of  a  broomstick 
stuck  in  the  earth.' " 

The  second-hand  booksellers  in  Leeds,  Bradford  and  other 
towns  in  the  diocese  would  not  look  at  copies  when  offered  them, 
they  had  such  a  glut  on  their  shelves  ;  and  it  was  not  an  unusual 
sight  to  see  slabs  of  bacon  in  pork-shops  placed  on  the  counter 
labelled  "  4^.  only  "  sustained  by  one  of  Simeon's  lucubrations 
upon  Justification,  or  to  receive  a  pennyworth  of  "  bull's-eyes  " 
in  a  cornet  from  one  of  Clayton's  Sermons  on  Assurance.  The 
gift  was  kindly  intended,  but  was  not  appreciated  in  any  case. 
It  was  a  standing  joke  among  Ordinands  that  if  every  one  had 
a  skeleton  in  his  cupboard  at  home,  they  went  off  from  Ripon 
each  with  one  in  his  portmanteau. 

In  the  palace  grounds  were  pits,  caused  by  the  sudden  collapse 
of  the  strata.  Below  the  surface  at  some  depth  were  subter- 
ranean streams,  never  seen,  that  corroded  the  sandy  conglomerate 
through  which  they  flowed,  and  which  latter  suddenly  gave 
way,  leaving  a  concavity  above.  The  Bishop  was  greatly  afraid 
lest  some  day  such  a  catastrophe  should  befall  his  house,  and 
he,  his  family  and  chaplain  should  go  down  quick  into  the  pit. 
What  he  did  not  see  was  that  this  was  a  figure  of  the  poor  un- 
digested, incoherent  Evangelicalism  in  which  he  believed ;  and 
that  there  were  currents,  deep  and  strong,  flowing  beneath  the 
crust,  causing  the  Protestantism  of  the  Established  Church  to 
give  way  everywhere,  and  where  least  expected,  and  that  these 
currents  were  irresistible. 

I  went  from  Ripon  diocese  to  that  of  York,  where  I  was  for 
five  years  under  Thomson,  who  was  then  Archbishop.  I  had 
been  appointed  by  Viscountess  Downe,  who  was  building  a  church 
in  an  outlying  portion  of  the  parish  of  Topcliffe,  and  who  also 
paid  the  stipend  of  the  perpetual  curate.  But  the  vicar  of 
Topcliffe  was  the  actual  nominator.  I  had  resigned  my  curacy 
at  Horbury  and  made  ready  to  move  to  Dalton,  when  an  in- 
explicable hitch  occurred.  I  went  to  Topcliffe  to  see  the  vicar. 
He  showed  me  letters  from  the  Archbishop  suggesting  "  dodges  " 
— I  can  give  them  no  other  name — by  which  he  might  exclude 
me.  I  said  that  this  was  very  unfair  :  he,  the  vicar,  had  written 
to  me  offering  the  curacy  of  Dalton,  and  on  the  strength  of  that 
I  had  left  Horbury. 

The  vicar,  Mr.  Hawkins,  a  sturdy,  straightforward  English- 
man, burst  out— "  I  will  not  do  the  Archbishop's  dirty  work 
for  him.    If  he  objects  to  you,  let  him  act  openly  and  above- 


206 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


board."  The  Archbishop  did  not  desire  to  fall  out  with  Lady 
Downe,  who  had  several  livings  in  the  diocese  in  her  gift,  as  also 
some  "  peculiars  "  which  Dr.  Thomson  wished  very  greatly  to 
get  under  his  own  jurisdiction.  So  eventually  I  was  instituted. 
Dr.  Thomson  had  been  Provost  of  Queen's  College,  Oxford,  in 
1855.  In  1861  he  was  made  Bishop  of  Gloucester  and  Bristol. 
Struck  by  his  appearance,  so  it  was  said,  Queen  Victoria  had  him 
transferred  to  York  after  he  had  been  ten  months  in  his  first  see, 
and  he  remained  Archbishop  for  twenty-eight  years.  Of  his 
ability  there  could  be  little  doubt.  As  to  his  religious  opinions  • 
I  should  say  they  were  Erastian,  and  he  only  postured  as  a 
Low  Churchman  because  he  was  strongly  opposed  to  the  High- 
Church  party  ;  and  he  used  the  Evangelicals  as  they  served  his 
ends.    Here  is  an  example  of  his  methods. 

At  Bridlington  the  parish  church  was  in  the  hands  of  the 
so-called  Simeonite  Trustees.  There  were  residents  in  the 
popular  watering-place  who  could  not  endure  the  way  in  which 
the  services  were  conducted  in  the  church,  and  the  sour  doctrine 
there  delivered  made  their  gorges  heave.  Now  an  adjoining 
parish  was  in  good  hands,  and  the  incumbent  of  this  erected  an 
iron  mission  chapel  on  his  side  of  the  boundary,  and  appointed 
to  it  a  curate  to  conduct  the  services  suitably.  At  this  end  of 
Bridlington  a  good  number  of  villa  residences  were  being  erected, 
in  fact,  it  was  spreading  towards  the  iron  chapel ;  and  here  also 
a  Sisterhood  had  a  convalescent  home.  The  chapel  was  always 
crowded  and  the  services  hearty.  The  Archbishop  exerted  him- 
self to  get  a  church  built  a  stone' s-throw  off,  on  the  Bridlington 
side  of  the  frontier,  and  no  sooner  was  this  completed  and  a 
strong  Evangelical  had  been  appointed  to  it,  than  he  withdrew 
the  licence  of  the  curate,  and  also  that  for  the  iron  chapel.  This 
naturally  led  to  the  migration  from  the  watering-place  of  all 
such  as  were  Churchmen  at  heart. 

Archbishop  Thomson  was  a  portly  man,  pompous  in  manner, 
and  the  text  applied  to  him  by  Dr.  Littledale  was  appropriate  : 
"  God,  I  thank  thee  that  I  am  not  as  other  men  are."  In  the 
evening  at  dinner,  in  purple  velvet,  with  purple  silk  apron  and 
stockings  and  silver  shoe-buckles,  he  presented  a  stately  figure, 
but  his  face  had  lost  its  handsomeness  when  I  knew  him.  The 
writer  in  the  Dictionary  of  National  Biography  states  that  he 
was  very  popular  with  the  artisan  class,  presumably  at  Sheffield. 
I  never  was  at  Sheffield,  so  I  cannot  say;  but  I  have  little 
doubt  that  he  was  valued  by  the  Dissenters,  as  doing  his  best 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


207 


to  hinder  Church  work  in  the  place  done  upon  definite  Church 
lines.  His  dread  of  anything  like  a  manifestation  of  corporate 
life  in  the  Church  induced  him  to  remain  sulking  at  Bishop- 
thorpe,  when  he  refused  to  attend  the  Pan-Anglican  Conference. 

He  objected  strongly  to  my  having  non-communicating  at- 
tendance at  Dalton.  I  said  that  I  would  stop  it  at  once  if  he 
would  point  out  to  me  the  rubric  requiring  the  withdrawal  of 
such  as  did  not  purpose  communicating.  "  But  the  children — 
I  don't  approve  of  the  presence  of  the  children."  "  Your 
Grace — it  was  the  same  with  the  Apostles  :  they  also  objected 
to  the  children  approaching  Christ.    History  repeats  itself." 

It  is  only  fair  to  say  that  when  Bishop  Fraser  of  Manchester 
appealed  to  him  for  his  opinion  relative  to  the  doctrine  held  and 
taught  by  Mr.  Gunton,  of  S.  John's,  Cheetham  Hill,  his  decision 
was  prompt,  just  and  orthodox ;  and  that  he  took  steps  to  expel 
Mr.  Voysey  from  his  cure,  when  he  contravened  the  first  prin- 
ciples of  the  Faith. 

When  I  left  Dalton  for  the  rectory  of  East  Mersea,  to  which  I 
was  presented  by  the  Crown,  he  told  me  that  he  had  given  a 
glowing  account  of  my  work  and  a  strong  recommendation  of 
myself  to  Mr.  Gladstone,  who  had  written  to  him  about  me.  I 
was  aware  of  the  value  of  that.  He  knew  nothing  of  my  work, 
and  he  wanted  greatly  to  get  rid  of  me  out  of  his  diocese. 

At  East  Mersea,  to  which  I  was  presented  in  1871,  I  was  in  the 
diocese  of  Rochester  till  its  subdivision,  and  then  was  in  that 
of  S.  Alban.  Claughton  was  Bishop  ;  he  was  the  son  of  the 
steward  of  Lord  Ward's  estates.  He  was  a  man  of  considerable 
presence.  He  did  well  at  Oxford  and  was  made  Professor  of 
Poetry.  I  never  saw  a  line  of  poetry  written  by  him.  He 
married  the  sister  of  Earl  Dudley,  his  pupil,  who  befriended  him 
throughout  life,  and  together  with  Bishop  Wilberforce  obtained 
for  him  the  bishopric  of  Rochester.  When  the  see  was  divided, 
he  took  that  of  S.  Alban.    He  resided  in  Danbury  Park. 

In  the  Middle  Ages  a  struggle  ensued  relative  to  Investitures, 
Gregory  VII  objecting  to  the  reception  of  the  pastoral  staff  by 
a  bishop  from  the  king.  But  now,  under  the  Public  Worship 
Regulation  Act,  the  English  Bishops  eagerly  pressed  their 
crooks  into  the  hands  of  the  Ex-divorce  Judge,  Lord  Penzance; 
and  Claughton  was  the  first  to  make  this  base  surrender,  and 
send  the  Rev.  A.  Tooth  to  him  for  condemnation  and  im- 
prisonment. 

Claughton's  daughter,  Amelia  Maria,  widow  of  the  Hon. 


208 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Augustus  Anson,  married  the  Duke  of  Argyll.  She  was  his 
second  wife.  By  his  first  wife  the  Duke  had  Lord  Lorne, 
who  married  Princess  Louise.  Dr.  Littledale's  text  for  Bishop 
Claughton  was:  "  He  that  giveth  his  virgin  in  marriage  doeth 
well." 

Through  these  alliances  Bishop  Claughton  became  intimate 
with  Royalty.  A  photographer  took  a  portrait  of  the  Princess 
of  Wales  and  the  Bishop  looking  over  an  album  together.  The 
artist  published  this  under  the  title  "  The  Princess  and  the  Bishop 
studying  the  Sacred  Scriptures,"  and  the  picture  had  in  con- 
sequence a  considerable  sale  among  pious  females.  The  younger 
brother  became  successively  Bishop  of  S.  Helena,  and  Colombo, 
ultimately  ending  his  days  as  Canon  of  S.  Paul's,  Archdeacon  of 
London,  and  Chaplain-General  of  the  Army.  When  he  went  to 
Ceylon  he  declared  "  that  he  was  going  to  lay  his  bones  amid 
his  adopted  flock  ;  "  but  second  thoughts  were  best,  and  he  did 
uncommonly  well  for  himself  on  his  return  to  England.  He  was 
succeeded  by  Jermyn,  a  good  man  if  there  ever  was  one.  He 
really  broke  down  through  repeated  dysentery  attacks,  and  had 
to  give  up.  He  became  Bishop  of  Barking,  and  afterwards  of 
Gibraltar.  The  first  Bishop  of  Colombo  was  Chapman,  who 
had  been  an  Eton  master.  At  one  time  it  was  possible  to 
encounter  stalking  together  arm-in-arm  down  the  Quadrant 
three  "  returned  empties  "  from  Colombo.  After  the  resignation 
of  Jermyn  a  long  delay  ensued  before  another  man  was  nominated 
to  Ceylon,  lest  he  also  should  get  a  call  to  return  home,  and 
London  would  laugh  to  see  four  of  these  ex-Colombites  marching 
together  arm  in  arm. 

Bishop  Claughton  of  Rochester  did  well  as  parish  priest  at 
Kidderminster.  Although  I  was  eight  years  in  his  diocese  I 
saw  him  but  twice ;  on  one  occasion  he  exchanged  half  a  dozen 
words  with  me. 

When  first  made  bishop  he  received  two  invitations  to  stay 
the  night,  from  a  parish  where  he  was  going  to  confirm — one 
from  the  squire,  the  other  from  the  churchwarden,  a  farmer. 
Now  in  Essex  nearly  every  farmhouse  is  entitled  a  "  Hall,"  and 
as  the  churchwarden  wrote  from  "Hightree  Hall"  the  Bishop 
accepted  his  invitation,  supposing  the  writer  lived  in  the  biggest 
place,  and  was  the  more  important  of  the  two.  He  was  vastly 
mortified  on  reaching  his  destination  to  find  that  the  "  Hall " 
was  a  farmhouse,  pervaded  by  the  smell  of  the  stables  and 
cowhouse. 


THE  VICTORIAN  BISHOPS 


209 


A  very  good  bishop  was  Christopher  Wordsworth  of  Lincoln. 
He  was  appointed  by  Disraeli  in  1868,  when  the  latter  said  to 
him  that  he  had  recommended  him  to  the  Queen  "  because  I 
have  confidence  in  your  abilities,  your  learning,  and  the  shining 
example  which  you  have  set,  that  a  Protestant  may  be  a  good 
Churchman." 

He  was  an  earnest  prelate,  visiting  throughout  his  diocese. 
Through  him  the  see  of  Southwell  was  created.  It  used  to  be 
told  of  William  Sewell  of  Exeter,  that  before  going  to  sleep  every 
night  he  looked  under  his  bed  to  see  that  no  Jesuit  was  secreted 
there.  Bishop  Wordsworth  was  almost  as  fanatical  in  his  horror 
of  Rome,  and  the  Pope,  whom  he  firmly  believed  was  Antichrist. 
I  met  him  at  the  Alt  Catholik  Congress  at  Cologne,  when  he  made 
a  speech  in  Latin,  which  none  could  follow,  owing  to  his  Anglican 
pronunciation  of  the  tongue.  Happily  he  had  had  his  address 
printed,  and  it  was  distributed  about  the  hall.  I  heard  several 
German  professors  exclaim  at  the  beauty  of  the  Latin.  In 
the  debate  on  the  Public  Worship  Regulation  Bill  he  withstood 
Archbishop  Tait  to  the  face,  but  his  opposition  was  disregarded. 

Henry  Phillpotts  of  Exeter  was  the  son  of  an  innkeeper  of 
the  Bell  at  Gloucester.  It  is  remarkable  that  this  well-known 
tavern  should  have  given  to  the  world  two  such  remarkable  men 
in  the  religious  world  as  Whitefield  and  Phillpotts.  Whitefield 
was  born  in  it,  and  after  his  father's  death  his  brother  continued 
to  keep  the  inn. 

Phillpotts  was  a  bit  of  a  pluralist,  for  along  with  the  bishopric 
of  Exeter  he  held  one  of  the  rich  canonries  of  Durham.  He 
was  the  Athanasius  of  the  day.  He  was  not  a  man  of  much 
presence — indeed  his  face  was  plain  and  did  not  bear  a  pleasant 
expression.  In  his  diocese  he  was  not  liked ;  and  his  nepotism 
gave  great  offence. 

It  is  of  the  Bishop  that  the  story  is  told,  how  that,  sitting  by 
a  lady  at  lunch,  she  said  to  him  :  "  Oh,  my  Lord,  do  you  not 
think  that  Devonshire  is  very  like  Switzerland  ?  "  "  Very," 
he  replied,  "  except  that  in  Devonshire  there  are  no  mountains, 
and  in  Switzerland  there  is  no  sea." 

Sitting  by  another,  and  noticing  that  she  crumbled  her  bread 
at  table,  he  remarked,  "  I  fear  I  make  you  nervous."  "  Oh, 
dear  no  !  It  is  a  habit  I  have  acquired.  When  I  sit  by  a  bishop 
I  crumble  with  one  hand,  when  by  an  archbishop  I  crumble 
with  both." 

When  my  uncle,  the  rector  of  the  parish  I  am  in,  went  up  to 


210 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


see  the  Bishop  on  some  occasion  or  other,  it  happened  to  be 
a  very  cold  day,  and  he  wore  a  white  woollen  muffler  about  his 
throat.  Without  thinking  of  removing  this,  he  was  introduced 
into  the  study.    The  Bishop  looked  hard  at  him  and  said  : 

"  Do  you  contemplate  committing  suicide  ?  " 

"  My  Lord  !  " 

"  By  hanging,"  pursued  the  Bishop :  "I  perceive  that  you 
have  already  adjusted  the  rope." 

Joseph  Dornford,  who  had  been  tutor  of  Oriel,  took  the 
rectory  of  Plymtree.  One  day  he  went  to  the  palace  in  ducks. 
Henry  of  Exeter  said  to  him  sternly  :  "  Mr.  Dornford,  are  those 
white  trousers  quite  clerical  ?  " 

"  Oh,  my  Lord  !    They  have  washed  white  !  "  was  the  reply. 

"  Then  I  perceive,"  retorted  the  Bishop,  "  that  the  dye  from 
your  trousers  has  run  into  your  necktie,  which  I  notice  is  black." 

I  shall  say  nothing  concerning  Bishop  (afterwards  Archbishop) 
Temple,  nor  Bishop  Bickersteth  of  Exeter,  as  they  belong  to 
recent  times. 

At  no  period  since  that  of  the  Caroline  prelates  have  we  had 
so  able  a  set  of  Bishops  as  at  the  present  time.  Some  of  them 
are  determined  to  show  that  the  tail  is  no  longer  to  wag  the  dog  ; 
they  will  be  leaders  ;  and  when  such  men  take  up  a  position  as 
leaders,  they  will  find  thousands  who  will  follow  them. 

Only  in  the  far  North  and  in  certain  Western  dioceses  lingers 
on  the  old  tradition  of  long  standing,  of  sending  to  them  extreme 
Evangelicals,  as  sulky  children  are  put  in  a  corner. 

But  generally  the  type  of  our  English  bishops  is  now  high  ; 
and  under  their  direction  no  one  need  despair  of  the  future  of  the 
Church  in  our  land. 

In  very  truth,  we  have  had  some  splendid  bishops,  men  of 
whom  any  Church  might  be  proud — great  scholars,  strong  in  their 
faith,  staunch  in  their  Churchmanship,  full  of  human  sympathy, 
most  lovable  ;  such  as  Lightfoot,  Westcott,  Creighton,  Stubbs, 
Benson,  and  Gore,  who  is  with  us  still.  Men — and  Churchmen, 
after  the  feeblings  of  a  former  generation,  men  who  could 
govern  and  direct,  and  who  could  be  trusted.  Looking  back  on 
the  past,  one  could  only  say  with  Ferdinand  Fabre,  "  O  Sainte 
Eglise  Catholique,  il  faut  bien  que  quelque  chose  de  divin  reside 
en  toi,  puisque  tes  pretres  n'ont  pu  reussir  a  te  perdre."  I 
would  but  change  one  word,  with  reference  to  England,  and  read 
eveques  in  place  of  pretres,  and  that  of  the  past. 


CHAPTER  IX 


ROUGH  WEATHER 

IF  the  Evangelicals  were  bitterly  hostile  to  the  movement  on 
religious  grounds,  so  also  were  the  Broad  Churchmen  led 
by  Dr.  Arnold,  and  Latitudinarians  under  Lord  John 
Russell.  The  former  were  Erastian,  and  would  cheerfully 
have  stretched  the  pegs  of  the  Establishment  so  as  to  shelter 
all  kinds  of  Christians  under  its  undenominational  canvas  tent ; 
the  Latitudinarians  were  indifferent  in  religious  matters,  looking 
on  all  religions  with  impartiality  as  more  or  less  superstitious. 
If  the  Evangelicals  attacked  with  bluster  that  could  do  little 
permanent  harm,  the  Broad  Church  and  Latitudinarians  assailed 
with  subtlety  far  more  deadly,  for  at  one  time  they  had  all  the 
power  of  the  Crown  and  State  at  their  back. 

It  would  appear  as  though  it  was  with  intent  to  outrage  the 
feelings  of  High  Churchmen  that  Dr.  Hampden  was  promoted  to 
the  bishopric  of  Hereford.  He  had  been  previously  appointed 
Regius  Professor  of  Divinity  at  Oxford,  and  his  Bampton  Lectures 
had  been  condemned  by  the  University  as  heretical,  and  he 
himself  had  been  denied  a  voice  in  the  nomination  of  University 
preachers. 

To  offend  not  High  Churchmen  only,  but  Churchmen  generally, 
Dr.  Lee  was  given  the  newly  founded  bishopric  of  Manchester, 
although  charged,  almost  certainly  unjustly,  with  drunkenness 
and  with  being  tipsy  even  during  the  performance  of  divine 
service.  Although  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  and  the  Bishop 
of  London  visited  Lord  John  Russell,  the  Prime  Minister,  and 
implored  him  to  have  these  charges  investigated  before  Dr.  Lee 
was  consecrated,  he  absolutely  refused  to  do  so — thinking  it  was 
an  unwarranted  charge,  and  an  insult  to  investigate  it.  The 
appointment  was  at  once  carried  out.  The  bishoprics  as  they 
fell  vacant  were  filled  with  Erastian  prelates,  and  at  a  later  date 
with  Evangelicals. 

211 


212 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


There  were  two  bishops  of  decided  Church  opinions  :  Denison 
of  Salisbury  (1837-1854),  and  after  him  Hamilton  (1854-1869). 
Blomfield  of  London  was  a  man  none  could  trust ;  he  shifted 
his  political  views,  and  in  Church  matters  was  unreliable.  Like 
Reuben,  he  was  unstable  as  water. 

In  1842  Bishop  Phillpotts  in  his  Triennial  Visitation  specially 
referred  to  the  Oxford  Tracts.  While  utterly  condemning 
Tract  Ninety,  he  upheld  the  general  teaching  of  the  Tracts, 
and  referred  more  especially  to  the  Unity  and  Authority  of  the 
Church,  the  necessity  of  the  Sacraments  and  the  value  of  the 
Liturgy  ;  and  then  proceeded  to  urge,  as  he  had  done  three  years 
previously,  "  the  duty  of  a  faithful  observance  of  the  Rubrics. 
True  it  is,  that  inveterate  usage  may  be  pleaded  for  the  non- 
observance  of  some  of  them.  But  of  those  not  all,  perhaps  not 
one,  may  have  been  irreclaimably  lost.  Be  it  our  care  to  revive 
what  we  may  ;  but  certainly  not  to  permit  any  others  to  fall 
into  disuse." 

Stimulated  by  these  admonitions  of  their  Bishop,  many  of 
his  clergy  instituted  changes  in  the  procedure  of  public  Church 
services,  and  amongst  these  the  adoption  of  the  surplice  in  the 
pulpit.  There  was  no  provision  in  the  rubric  for  any  change  of 
vesture  in  the  Communion  Service,  at  which  alone  a  Sermon 
was  contemplated.  The  priest  in  surplice  left  the  altar  for  the 
pulpit,  and  returned  from  the  pulpit  to  the  altar  to  continue 
the  Liturgy.  These  changes,  however,  excited  expressions  of 
discontent,  resulting  in  some  parishes  in  disputes  and  open 
ruptures.  In  1844  at  Helston  in  Cornwall  there  were  dis- 
turbances, and  on  October  4  the  doings  of  the  incumbent,  the 
Rev.  W.  Blunt,  became  the  subject  of  judicial  investigation  by 
the  Bishop.    Eight  matters  of  complaint  were  enumerated: 

(1)  The  use  of  the  surplice  in  preaching. 

(2)  Extempore  preaching  instead  of  a  read  sermon. 

(3)  Disuse  of  a  prayer  before  the  sermon. 

(4)  Extempore  address  on  the  Second  Lesson  in  the  evening 
instead  of  a  formal  read  sermon. 

(5)  Requiring  the  whole  congregation  to  remain  throughout 
the  Communion  Service,  though  not  all  communicating. 

(6)  Refusing  the  Holy  Communion  to  a  parishioner  baptized 
by  a  Roman  Catholic. 

(7)  Refusing  to  read  the  Burial  Service  over  an  unbaptized  man. 

(8)  Refusal  to  marry  without  production  of  the  Baptismal 
Register. 


ROUGH  WEATHER 


213 


Some  of  these  charges  seem  to  us  at  this  day  very  astounding. 
In  the  case  of  No.  6  Mr.  Blunt  was  clearly  in  the  wrong. 

The  judgment  of  the  Bishop  was  pronounced  on  October  23 ; 
and  with  regard  to  the  surplice  he  pointed  out  that  it  was  the 
sole  legal  dress  ;  its  use  was  enacted  by  Edward  VI,  reversed  by 
Mary,  and  re-enacted  by  Elizabeth,  and  that  he  purposed  to 
order  all  clergy  to  wear  it  in  their  ministrations  if  the  other  more 
costly  vestments  were  not  provided  by  the  parish. 

In  accordance  with  this  notification  the  Bishop  issued  his 
"  Order  "  (November  20,  1844)  to  the  same  effect. 

This  produced  excitement  throughout  the  diocese.  Parish 
meetings  to  protest  against  it  were  generally  summoned,  when 
on  December  3  the  Bishop  issued  a  letter  "to  a  Rural  Dean," 
suggesting  that  obedience  to  the  "  Order  "  might  be  deferred  till 
a  subsequent  Sunday,  "  in  order  that  you  may  all  be  able  to 
satisfy  your  people  that  the  use  of  it  (the  surplice)  is  adopted 
by  you  not  from  any  preference  on  your  own  part  but  from 
obedience  to  your  Bishop." 

At  S.  Sidwell's  by  Exeter,  Francis  Courtenay,  the  incumbent, 
had  for  three  years  adopted  the  surplice  in  the  pulpit,  together 
with  the  observance  of  some  other  disused  orders  in  the  Rubrics  ; 
but  on  December  8,  in  consequence  of  the  excitement  caused 
by  the  judgment  in  the  Helston  case,  and  the  "  Order,"  several 
of  the  congregation  walked  out  of  church  when  Mr.  Courtenay 
ascended  the  pulpit  in  surplice,  as  had  been  his  wont. 

By  December  12  nearly  all  the  city  parishes  met  in  vestry 
and  had  their  say,  and  on  this  day  was  held  the  vestry  meeting 
of  the  united  parishes  of  S.  Sidwell  and  S.  James,  comprising  a 
population  of  about  9,000.  The  meeting  was  conducted  decor- 
ously, and  an  address  was  drawn  up  to  the  Bishop,  expressing 
the  regret  of  the  parishioners  that  changes  should  be  made  in 
the  Service  by  the  revival  of  obsolete  usages.  To  this  the  Bishop 
made  a  courteous  reply  on  December  18,  going  over  the  grounds 
again,  and  requesting  that  the  opposition  should  be  withdrawn 
and  his  authority  respected. 

On  December  23  the  Bishop  issued  a  letter  to  the  clergy,  in 
which,  after  alluding  to  the  agitation  against  the  use  of  the 
surplice  in  preaching,  he  withdrew  his  "  Order  "  as  respecting 
that  garment,  but  added  that  where  now  used  without  offence, 
or  where  previously  used,  the  "  Order  "  was  to  remain  in  force. 

The  notice  of  withdrawal  created  confusion,  and  placed  some 
of  the  clergy  in  a  position  of  difficulty. 


214 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


At  S.  Sidwell's,  according  to  the  advice  given  in  the  "  Letter," 
Mr.  Courtenay,  and  the  vicars  of  the  other  city  churches,  and 
the  incumbent  of  S.  James's,  continued  to  use  the  surplice  ;  but 
later,  this  latter  gave  way. 

On  the  following  Sunday,  January  12,  on  leaving  the  church, 
both  Mr.  Courtenay  and  Mr.  Armstrong,  incumbent  of  S.  Paul's, 
were  mobbed  and  followed  to  their  houses  by  a  hooting  and 
howling  crowd,  threatening  personal  violence.  Police  protection 
was  now  provided,  and  as  a  rabble  of  two  thousand  had  collected 
to  follow  Mr.  Courtenay  from  the  church  to  his  house,  situated 
at  some  considerable  distance,  and  as  it  was  excited  and 
threatening,  the  police  had  to  close  round  him  and  keep  the 
assailants  at  bay  with  their  truncheons.  In  the  evening  the 
preacher,  the  Rev.  S.  Coleridge,  was  similarly  mobbed. 

On  the  21st  the  Mayor  wrote  to  the  Bishop,  detailing  the 
riotous  proceedings  on  the  preceding  Sunday,  and  stating  that 
on  the  latter  occasion  the  whole  available  police  force  had  been 
required  to  protect  the  clergy ;  and  he  added  that  if  the  mob 
increased  in  numbers  and  in  violence  on  ensuing  Sundays,  he 
could  not  be  answerable  for  the  consequences. 

Accordingly  on  January  22  the  Bishop  absolved  the  clergy 
from  the  obligation  to  wear  the  surplice  when  preaching.  This 
was  communicated  to  the  vestry  meetings,  and  the  disturbance 
ceased. 

From  January  1845  things  went  on  quietly  in  the  parish  of 
S.  Sidwell's,  when,  after  four  years,  the  riot  broke  out  again. 
Certain  of  the  city  churches  had  been  lent  by  their  incumbents 
to  a  sort  of  society  of  volunteers  who  undertook  to  supply — 
what  was  then  a  novelty — evening  services,  in  addition  to  the 
ordinary  parochial  services  in  the  afternoon.  It  was  a  High- 
Church  Society,  and  on  the  evening  of  Good  Friday,  and  again 
on  August  27,  the  same  clergyman,  Rev.  J.  Ingle,  had  officiated, 
and  on  both  occasions  preached  in  his  surplice.  There  had  been 
some  slight  indications  of  disapproval  on  these  occasions,  but 
nothing  more.  But  on  Sunday  evening,  October  29,  1848,  a 
demonstration  had  been  organized.  The  church  from  end  to  end, 
as  also  the  galleries,  were  packed  with  a  congregation  the  majority 
of  whom  had  never  been  seen  in  a  house  of  God  before.  As  soon 
as  the  preacher  mounted  the  pulpit,  the  storm  burst  forth,  an 
uproar  of  shouts  of  derision,  hooting,  catcalls  broke  out,  and 
was  so  continuously  maintained  that  not  a  coherent  sentence  of 
the  preacher's  sermon  could  be  heard.    This  continued  for  so 


ROUGH  WEATHER 


215 


long  a  period,  and  those  who  attempted  to  appease  the  uproarious 
crowd  having  failed  utterly  in  their  endeavour,  the  Mayor  of 
the  city  was  summoned.  He,  seeing  that  it  was  useless  and 
indecorous  to  continue  the  service,  appealed  to  the  preacher  to 
leave  the  pulpit,  and  this  was  complied  with. 

The  mob  then  assembled  in  the  main  street  with  evident 
design  of  there  continuing  the  outrage.  The  mayor  entreated 
and  then  directed  Mr.  Ingle  to  leave  the  church  by  another 
route  ;  to  this  Mr.  Ingle  objected,  but  eventually,  on  the  urgency 
of  his  friends,  he  complied  with  the  Mayor's  requirements. 

The  Mayor  now  proceeded  to  where  the  rabble  was  in  waiting 
with  purpose  to  duck  the  clergyman  in  a  horsepond ;  but  the  mob 
having  discovered  that  he  had  left  the  church  by  another  door, 
tore  hooting  down  the  main  street,  and  meeting  two  other  and 
entirely  inoffensive  clergymen,  made  them  the  butt  of  their 
abuse.    Fortunately  for  himself,  Mr.  Ingle  managed  to  escape. 

After  this,  the  incumbent  withdrew  the  use  of  the  church  for 
the  evening  services. 

On  November  9,  however,  the  Bishop  held  an  inquiry,  and 
requested  that  they  might  be  resumed,  but  directed  that  the 
surplice  should  not  be  used  in  them.  The  sermon  in  the 
evening  service  stood  on  a  different  footing  from  that  in  the 
morning,  and  no  provision  had  been  made  for  it  in  the  Prayer 
Book.1 

The  surplice  riots  were  not  confined  to  Exeter  ;  they  broke 
out  in  London  and  elsewhere,  and  the  press  did  its  utmost 
to  rouse  the  people  against  the  reformers.  The  "  Puseyites,"  as 
the  men  were  called  who  trod  in  the  steps  of  the  Tractarians, 
were  held  up  to  mockery  in  picture  and  in  leader.  The  London 
Times  gravely  rated  them,  and  they  were  ridiculed  in  Punch. 
Novelists — such  as  Mrs.  Henry  Wood — published  absurd  carica- 
tures of  them,  knowing  none  personally,  setting  up  scarecrows 
to  batter  them  with  abuse.  On  November  5,  in  many  places 
(e.%.,  in  the  Cathedral  yard  at  Exeter)  figured  a  Puseyite  priest 
in  cassock,  surplice  and  stole  as  the  Guy  Fawkes  of  the  day,  to  be 
given  to  the  flames. 

Yet  the  points  of  dispute,  the  matters  that  excited  such 
fury,  were  but  trifles.  "Ritualism"  was  not  yet  thought  of. 
Perhaps  no  parson  underwent  more  cruel  and  persistent  per- 

1  I  have  employed  for  this  account  of  the  Exeter  surplice  riots  the 
MS.  account  of  them  written  by  Dr.  T.  Shapter,  M.D.,  of  Exeter,  who 
was  mayor  at  the  time,  kindly  lent  me  by  Chancellor  Edmunds. 


216 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


secution  at  that  period  than  did  the  Rev.  George  Rundle  Prynne 
of  Plymouth,  and  his  case  was  the  more  grievous  because  his 
principal  assailants  were  clergy  of  the  Church  of  England. 

S.  Andrew's  was  the  parish  church  of  Plymouth,  and  it  had 
been  secured  by  Protestant  Trustees.  Plymouth,  Devonport 
and  Stonehouse,  the  "  Three  Towns,"  had  expanded  enormously, 
and  the  spiritual  and  moral  destitution  of  the  great  seaport, 
military  establishment  and  dockyard  had  become  serious,  for  the 
population  had  hopelessly  outgrown  all  existing  provision  for 
supplying  its  spiritual  wants.  By  the  so-called  Peel  Act  of 
1843,  three  new  parishes  had  been  constituted  in  Plymouth — 
S,  Peter's,  S.  James'  the  Less,  and  S.  John's.  The  two  former 
were  taken  out  of  the  parishes  of  S.  Andrew  and  East  Stonehouse  ; 
the  latter  out  of  that  of  Charles.  The  new  district  assigned  to 
S.  Peter's  contained  a  population  of  about  four  thousand,  almost 
all  poor,  many  abjectly  so. 

To  this  Mr.  Prynne  was  appointed  in  1848.  There  was  no 
church,  but  on  a  tongue  of  high  ground  stood  an  ugly  conventicle, 
Eldad  Chapel,  that  had  been  the  preaching-house  of  Dr.  Hawker, 
who  had  seceded  from  the  Church.  On  his  death  it  was  sold, 
and  bought  to  serve  as  the  church  of  S.  Peter.  It  was  a  typical 
conventicle,  surrounded  internally  with  galleries,  furnished  with 
a  three-decker  to  which  all  the  seats  converged,  and  destitute 
of  a  chancel  of  any  sort.  This  last  was  however  now  provided 
from  the  designs  of  Mr.  George  Street,  in  very  respectable  Gothic, 
but  small.  The  three-decker  was  thrown  out  and  the  galleries 
removed.  Directly  after  the  opening  of  S.  Peter's,  in  November 
1848,  Mr.  Prynne  let  it  appear  that  he  was  determined  on  taking 
a  decided  line  in  his  teaching  ;  but  his  ritual  was  very  moderate. 
However  moderate  it  might  be,  it  roused  opposition,  not  among 
the  parishioners,  but  among  a  host  of  Evangelical  busybodies 
and  clergy  of  the  Low-Church  party.  The  charges  brought 
against  him  appear  to  us  at  the  present  day  absurdly  trivial — 
such  as  the  use  of  the  surplice  in  the  pulpit,  and  the  reading  of  the 
"  Church  Militant  prayer  "  before  giving  the  blessing  in  ante- 
Communion,  the  chanting  of  the  Psalms,  the  bowing  of  the  head 
at  the  sacred  name,  intoning  the  prayers,  and  omitting  a  prayer 
before  the  sermon.  The  collecting  of  alms  in  bags  was  also 
pronounced  to  be  inconsistent  with  Protestantism.  A  local 
paper  hoped  that  the  "  man  "  who  introduced  the  alms-bags 
would  himself  speedily  "  receive  the  sack."  On  a  much  later 
occasion,  in  the  diocese  of  Lincoln  an  aggrieved  parishioner 


ROUGH  WEATHER 


217 


complained  to  Bishop  Wordsworth  that  his  vicar,  the  Rev. 
G.  E.  Smith,  "  collected  the  arms  of  his  congregation  in  bags!  " 

The  ringleader  of  the  opposition  was  the  Rev.  J.  Hatchard, 
Vicar  of  S.  Andrew's,  backed  up  by  a  handful  of  retired  naval 
and  military  officers.  They  sat  as  a  quasi-vigilance  committee 
for  some  years,  and  carried  on  warfare  against  Mr.  Prynne. 
They  got  up  public  meetings  to  protest  against  his  Papistical 
proceedings,  they  memorialized  the  Bishop.  They  controlled 
and  inspired.the  local  press,  which  poured  forth  the  most  scurrilous 
articles  against  the  Vicar  of  S.  Peter's. 

The  High-Church  practices  at  Eldad  were  for  a  while  driven 
from  the  thoughts  of  the  Plymouthians  by  the  appearance  in 
their  midst  of  Asiatic  cholera  during  the  summer  of  1849.  It 
raged  in  the  slums  of  the  Three  Towns,  and  with  especial  virulence 
in  the  densely  thronged  alleys  in  S.  Peter's  parish.  People 
died  like  flies.  It  spread  to  Exeter,  to  Tavistock,  and  other 
towns.  A  special  cholera  hospital  was  erected  for  the  sufferers 
in  Plymouth  and  the  adjoining  Devonport  and  Stonehouse,  and 
this  was  in  S.  Peter's  district.  A  sisterhood  had  been  started  in 
Devonport  by  Miss  Sellon  two  years  previous  to  the  licensing  of 
Eldad  Chapel  as  a  church.  The  Sisters  at  once  placed  them- 
selves at  the  disposal  of  Mr.  Prynne,  and  to  be  nearer  the  scene 
of  their  labours  moved  into  his  parish.  It  was  then,  when  men 
and  women  were  dying  about  him,  that  for  his  own  strengthening 
and  that  of  his  fellow  workers,  Prynne  started  a  daily  Eucharist, 
which  has  not  been  intermitted  to  this  present.  Then  it  was 
offered  in  the  convent  chapel,  later  in  the  Parish  Church.  That 
chapel  at  the  time  was  a  tent.  Recently  the  Guild  of  S.  George 
in  the  parish  has  put  up  a  brass  tablet  in  memory  of  this  historic 
event  in  the  Hall,  as  it  is  almost  the  exact  spot  where  the  chapel- 
tent  formerly  stood. 

During  the  time  when  this  fearful  epidemic  raged  Mr.  Prynne, 
his  curate  and  the  Sisters,  laboured  indefatigably.  On  one 
occasion,  in  one  of  the  small  dirty  courts,  the  Vicar  was  visiting 
the  sick,  and  receiving  no  answer  when  he  knocked  at  one  door, 
he  went  in  and  found  every  inmate  dead,  and  the  house  reeking 
with  the  most  horrible  stench.  He  and  the  curate  between  them 
removed  the  dead  into  the  street.  I  quote  a  portion  of  a  narrative 
by  Mr.  Prynne  given  in  Mr.  A.  Clifton  Kelway's  Memoirs  of 
G.  Rundle  Prynne. 1 

"  I  well  remember  on  one  occasion  having  been  called  to  see 

1  London,  1905.    The  book  well  deserves  to  be  read  and  thought  over. 


218 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


a  poor  woman  lying  on  a  mattress  on  the  floor  in  the  agonies 
of  cholera,  and  close  on  her  confinement.  It  was  a  low,  over- 
crowded room.  I  had  to  step  over  a  dead  body  to  get  at  her. 
Another  dead  body  had  just  been  put  into  its  thin  coffin  and 
was  being  lowered  through  the  window  into  the  street  below. 
The  screams  of  the  people  below,  many  of  whom  were  Irish,  in 
their  terror  and  excitement,  were  most  thrilling.  Women  would 
throw  themselves  on  their  knees  in  the  street  and  catch  hold  of 
my  knees,  entreating  me  to  come  to  the  aid  of  some  stricken  one. 

"  I  cannot  pass  over  this  subject  without  speaking  of  the 
devoted  and  heroic  labours  of  the  Sisters  of  Mercy  during  this 
visitation,  and  of  the  invaluable  assistance  they  rendered  us. 
They  were  a  band  of  heroines  in  the  army  of  God ;  the  thought 
of  personal  danger  did  not  seem  to  enter  their  minds.  They 
had  a  tent  in  the  field  near  the  hospital  to  harbour  and  feed  the 
orphaned  children. 

"  One  morning  my  assistant  curate,  Mr.  Hetling,  met  one  of 
the  Sisters  carrying  something  which  seemed  heavy,  folded  in 
her  arms.  He  asked  what  it  was.  She  had  to  admit  that  it  was 
the  body  of  a  child  that  had  just  died  of  cholera,  and  that  she 
was  carrying  it  to  the  house  where  the  ready-made  coffins  were 
kept.  Another  instance  of  self-sacrificing  devotion  of  a  still 
more  striking  character  soon  after  came  to  my  notice.  A  poor 
woman  struck  down  with  cholera  had  just  lost  her  infant  child 
that  she  had  been  nursing.  Her  sufferings  were  aggravated  by 
not  having  the  accustomed  relief.  A  Sister  was  kneeling  by 
the  side  of  the  poor  woman  and  doing  the  infant's  part  in 
relieving  her,  when  the  doctor  came  in  and  caught  her  in  the  act. 

1  Sister  A  '  said  he,  '  you  must  promise  me  not  to  do  that 

again.'  The  Lord  seemed  to  have  taken  away  all  fear  from 
those  who  were  ministering  to  His  suffering  members." 

In  March  1852  Mr.  Hetling  wrote  to  the  Bishop :  "  It  has  been 
my  lot  for  a  quarter  of  a  century  to  have  seen  and  borne  an  active 
part  in  very  much  of  suffering,  pain  and  death.  Formerly  in 
medical  practice,  I  have  seen  the  whole  course  of  cholera  in 
London,  Paris,  and  Bristol,  and  lastly  here,  in  my  office  as  deacon. 
I  have  beheld  many  acts  of  self-devotion  to  its  sufferers  and 
victims,  yet  never  have  I  witnessed  anything  that  surpassed, 
or  even  equalled,  the  self-abandonment  and  self-sacrifice  of 
these  humble  Sisters.  .  .  .  Stretched  upon  the  bed,  saturated 
with  the  sickness  of  this  dreadful  disease,  their  persons  and 
dresses  steeped  in  its  poison,  I  have  seen  the  sick  and  dying 


ROUGH  WEATHER 


219 


encompassed  with  their  arms,  the  cramped  limbs  embraced  and 
chafed,  their  heads  reclining  on  their  necks  ;  now  wiping  with 
a  gentle  hand  the  fatal  dampness  from  their  sunk  faces,  now 
with  affectionate  entreaty  pouring  medicine  into  their  mouths, 
and  then,  in  the  intervals  of  repose,  with  lips  close  to  their 
half-dull  ears,  whispering  some  kind  words  of  love,  hope  of 
pardon  for  past  sins,  or  repeating  a  short  prayer  or  sentence 
from  the  Litany  ;  taking  their  hasty  meal  from  the  common  stock 
in  the  centre  of  the  room,  or  often  at  the  bedside,  often  leaving 
it  unfinished  to  perform  some  menial  act.  And  all  this,  too, 
amidst  the  gloom  of  that  long  array  of  shrivelled,  collapsed 
and  leaden  forms  and  faces,  behind  whose  outward  shroud  Death 
was  riding  triumphantly.  They  were  awful  times  and  solemn 
scenes.  There  was  one  redeeming  feature — there  was  a  halo  of 
sanctity  round  the  persons  of  these  calm  Sisters  which  inspired 
hope  and  even  confidence,  and  which,  more  than  all,  checked 
and  repressed  the  irreverence  and  untimely  merriment  and 
pleasantry  too  common  in  the  wards  of  a  hospital.  That 
hospital  was  a  sacred  place.  The  medical  gentlemen,  who 
indeed  right  nobly  exercised  their  high  profession,  often  ex- 
pressed the  security  in  which  they  left  the  nurses  under  their 
direction." 

The  cholera  epidemic  gradually  died  away.  The  Sisterhood 
having  moved  into  S.  Peter's  parish,  the  Bishop  laid  the  founda- 
tion-stone of  a  house  for  the  community.  The  cholera  had  left 
so  many  orphans  who  were  destitute,  that  the  Sisters  were  almost 
compelled  to  make  provision  for  them,  and  they  started  an 
orphanage  for  girls. 

For  a  short  while  the  concerted  attacks  on  S.  Peter's  abated, 
out  of  very  shame  felt  by  those  who  were  talkers  rather  than 
labourers.  Yet  they  had  worked,  even  in  the  cholera  year,  by 
acting  secretly  and  gathering  information  for  another  attack, 
to  be  delivered  when  admiration  for  the  self-devotion  of  the 
Sisters  and  the  clergy  of  S.  Peter's  should  have  cooled  down. 

Mr.  Prynne  had  become  chaplain  to  the  Sisterhood.  Now 
the  attack  was  renewed.  Accusations  were  brought  against 
the  Sisters  for  saying  "  Lauds;  "  also  for — so  it  was  asserted — 
doing  no  work  upon  Wednesdays  and  Fridays,  and  compelling 
the  orphans  under  their  charge  to  go  to  confession — neither  of 
these  latter  accusations  was  true. 

In  1852  a  Cambridge  parson,  James  Spurrell,  issued  a  pamphlet 
against  the  Sisterhood.    He  had  lighted  upon  a  Miss  Campbell, 


220 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


who  had  entered  as  a  novice  and  had  left,  and  he  worked  her 
"  for  all  she  was  worth." 

Miss  Campbell,  Scottish  as  her  name  shows,  was  an  impression- 
able, somewhat  self-willed  young  lady.  She  had  been  in  France, 
and  had  been  greatly  impressed  with  the  dignity  of  worship 
and  the  piety  she  saw  in  the  Roman  Church,  and  she  made  up 
her  mind  to  join  that  Church  and  become  a  nun.  But  before 
doing  so,  her  mother  urged  her  to  go  into  Miss  Sellon's  Community 
for  a  twelvemonth,  and  see  how  she  relished  conventual  life. 
She  did  so,  and  Miss  Sellon  at  once  found  that  she  was  extremely 
ignorant  of  what  the  Church  of  England  was  and  what  were  her 
doctrines,  which  was  natural  enough  in  one  who  presumably  had 
been  reared  in  Presbyterianism.  The  rules  of  the  Community 
of  which  "  Mother  Lydia  "  was  head  were  undoubtedly  severe, 
and  calculated  to  deprive  the  Sisters  very  much  of  wills  of  their 
own.    The  Scottish  girl  soon  tired  of  this,  and  left. 

The  revelations  Miss  Campbell  made  to  Mr.  Spurrell  were, 
however,  not  very  dreadful.  What  follows  refers  to  the  daughter 
house  at  Bristol.  The  Sisters  said  the  Canonical  Hours,  read 
Thomas  a  Kempis'  Imitation  of  Christ,  used  the  Sarum  Psalter 
translated,  were  not  allowed  to  read  novels  or  indeed  any  books 
without  the  consent  of  the  Superior,  nor  to  receive  or  send 
letters  that  had  not  been  submitted  to  her.  "  That  the  Reader 
may  have  a  correct  idea  of  the  employments  of  these  Sisters 
devoted  to  religion,  it  may  be  stated  that,  having  all  the  menial 
work  to  do  for  themselves,  it  was  no  uncommon  thing  for  these 
young  ladies,  brought  up  in  all  the  refinements  of  polite  life, 
to  be  carrying  at  half-past  five  o'clock  in  the  morning  a  large 
dust-barrel  to  the  top  of  the  court.  A  little  later  in  the  day 
the  same  Sisters  were  engaged  sweeping  out  the  house,  cleaning 
the  grates,  making  the  fire,  pumping  the  water,  and  other  of  the 
occupations  of  domestic  servants.  One  would  have  occasionally 
to  carry  the  dinner  to  the  bakehouse,  or  to  fetch  beer  from  the 
public-house — duties  strangely  enough  intermingled  with  Prime, 
Terse  (sic),  Sext,  Nones,  etc.,  visiting  the  poor,  and  Common 
Prayer  twice  a  day  at  the  Cathedral  [at  Bristol]."  1 

In  the  summer  of  1852,  when  passions  were  inflamed  by 
Spurrell's  pamphlet,  the  wrath  of  the  local  Protestants  was 
roused  by  the  announcement  that  the  Bishop  intended  holding  a 
Confirmation  in  S.  Peter's  Church  in  the  ensuing  autumn.  The 

1  Miss  Sellon  and  the  Sisters  of  Mercy:  An  Exposure  (London,  1852), 
p.  29. 


ROUGH  WEATHER 


221 


walls  of  the  town  were  placarded  with  bills,  calling  upon  parents 
to  refrain  from  letting  their  children  be  confirmed  at  S.  Peter's, 
and  at  a  meeting  of  the  Plymouth  Orphan  Asylum  Committee 
a  resolution  was  proposed  and  was  seconded  by  Mr.  Hadow,  the 
minister  of  S.  Andrew's  Chapel,  and  supported  by  Mr.  Hatchard 
of  S.  Andrew's  Parish  Church  and  two  other  Plymouth  clergy,  not 
to  allow  any  of  the  orphans  of  the  establishment  to  be  confirmed 
at  S.  Peter's. 

And  now  broke  out  a  savage  attack  on  the  Sisters  and  Mr. 
Prynne  on  account  of  the  practice  of  Confession. 

Meetings  were  held  to  denounce  the  practice  of  Confession. 
One  called  in  S.  George's  Hall  at  Plymouth  was  described  as  a 
11  monster  meeting,"  and  the  speakers  were  three  clergymen, 
Messrs.  Hatchard,  Greaves  and  Nantes,  two  captains  of  engi- 
neers, a  dissenting  preacher,  a  wine  merchant  and  some  laymen, 
of  more  or  less  insignificance.  Nearly  all  were  members  of  the 
"  Plymouth  Church  Reform  Association,"  the  object  of  which 
was  to  obtain  a  revision  of  the  Prayer  Book  "  with  a  removal 
therefrom  of  all  ground  and  pretext  for  Romish  doctrine  and 
practice,  and  a  wider  comprehension  of  Christians  within  the 
pale  of  the  National  Church." 

Definite  charges  were  now  made  against  the  Sisters  and  Mr. 
Prynne.  Mr.  Hatchard  had  managed  to  lure  a  girl  away  from 
the  Sisters'  orphanage  by  promising  to  get  her  a  good  place 
and  by  preventing  her  mother  from  obtaining  employment  in  a 
factory  till  the  girl  was  removed.  He  took  her — she  was  aged 
fourteen — into  his  own  house,  and  she  was  induced  to  make 
specific  charges  against  Mr.  Prynne  and  the  Sisters:  that  the 
orphans  were  compelled  to  go  to  confession,  and  that  Mr.  Prynne 
had  asked  her  indecent  questions.  The  indictment  was  com- 
mitted to  writing  under  the  instigation  of  the  girl's  mother. 
The  Rev.  Mr.  Childs,  of  S.  Mary's,  Devonport,  secured  another 
girl's  testimony  much  to  the  same  effect ;  she  had  been  in- 
veigled into  this  by  a  spinster  lady  who  was  a  fanatic  in  the 
Protestant  cause.  A  third  girl  was  also  got  hold  of  and  induced 
to  say  much  the  same  thing,  but  her  conscience  reproached  her, 
and  she  went  before  a  magistrate,  and  in  the  presence  of  witnesses 
declared  that  she  retracted  all  the  accusations  that  she  had  been 
persuaded  to  make. 

The  Bishop  hereupon  held  an  investigation  at  Plymouth. 
The  girl  befriended  by  Mr.  Hatchard  was  interviewed  privately 
by  the  Bishop,  Messrs.  Hatchard  and  Greaves,  Mr.  Prynne  and 


222 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


his  curate  Mr.  Darling,  as  to  her  private  life.  She  acknowledged 
during  the  inquiry  that  before  the  age  of  twelve  she  had  been 
guilty  of  sins  which  perfectly  appalled  the  few  persons  who  were 
allowed  to  hear  this  part  of  the  evidence  ;  she  had,  however, 
been  received  by  Miss  Sellcn  and  maintained  for  some  time,  till 
she  was  wanted  by  Mr.  Hatchard  in  1849,  to  give  evidence  against 
her  benefactress.  Then  her  mother  was  informed  by  her  em- 
ployer (a  Mr.  Soper)  that  she  would  be  turned  off  unless  she  took 
her  child  home.  This  was  done,  and  the  child  was  duly  produced 
at  the  inquiry.  The  girl  admitted  that  she  had  been  induced  to 
confess  ;  and  that  she  had  revealed  to  a  clergyman,  poor  girl, 
the  sickening  load  of  guilt  which,  it  may  be  hoped,  lay  heavy 
on  her  mind ;  and  questions  were  put  to  her  of  which  nothing 
further  appears  than  that  in  the  opinion  of  the  Bishop  they 
were  justified  by  the  shocking  acknowledgments  out  of  which 
they  arose. 

Perhaps  Mr.  Hatchard  had  not  known  all  that  now  came  out, 
but  he  learned  it  then,  and  he  did  not  express  the  slightest  shame 
or  regret  for  his  share  in  the  transaction — nor,  with  the  facts  fully 
before  him,  did  it  apparently  occur  to  him  that  he  had  done 
anything  but  what  was  Christian  and  praiseworthy,  in  attempting 
to  damage  an  obnoxious  cause  and  gratify  the  Plymouth  public 
at  the  probable  cost  of  a  human  soul. 

We  come  now  to  Mr.  Child's  witnesses.  The  first  was  a  girl 
who  passed  under  two  different  names,  and  is  described  as 
giving,  with  an  offensive  flippancy  of  manner,  a  detailed  account 
of  her  own  confession,  with  a  due  proportion  of  coarseness  in 
the  supposed  interrogator  and  levity  in  herself.  She  said  that 
she  had  heard  from  the  girl  who  had  just  appeared  that  Mr. 
Prynne  asked  improper  questions,  and  she  had  gone  to  confession 
for  no  other  purpose  than  to  ascertain  whether  this  was  the  case. 
She  related  how  that  she  had  received  absolution  kneeling  back 
to  back  with  Mr.  Prynne,  at  the  Confessional  Creed  (whatever 
she  meant  by  that),  and  that  the  absolution  began  "  Reverend 
Father  in  God,  I  beseech  thee  give  me  thy  blessing,"  and  was 
to  the  effect  that  she  might  have  "  health,  success  and  so  on." 
This  girl  had  not  been  an  orphan,  but  a  servant  in  the  convent, 
and  had  been  dismissed  for  bad  conduct ;  and  after  she  left  it 
was  discovered  that  she  had  been  in  the  habit  of  purloining  and 
getting  rid  of  various  articles  on  which  she  could  lay  her  hand. 
Mr.  Prynne  never  had  received  her  confession,  and  once  only 


ROUGH  WEATHER 


223 


had  he  spoken  to  her  of  Confirmation,  and  had  not  even  mentioned 
confession.  The  girl  was  evidently  an  unprincipled  liar,  and 
carried  her  falsehoods  to  those  to  whom  she  conceived  they 
would  be  acceptable. 

The  second  of  Mr.  Child's  cases,  C.  D.,  had  written  this  :  "  I 
went  to  Mr.  Prynne  Fridays,  on  which  day  I  told  him  of  the 
faults  I  had  committed  during  the  past  week  ;  on  which  day  he 
gave  me  the  following  directions  :  To  lie  on  the  hearthstone  for 
ten  minutes  every  night  after  prayers.  .  .  .  Every  month  he  asked 
me  the  question — 'if  ever  any  impure  thought  came  into  my 
mind.'  He  also  asked  me  '  if  ever  I  kept  company  with  any 
young  man,  etc.'  " 

CD.  did  not  appear,  but  in  her  stead  the  following  declaration 
was  read,  which  she  had  made  alone  and  voluntarily  before  a 
magistrate  of  Devonport.  It  appears  that  her  statement  to 
Mr.  Child  was  almost  as  untrue  as  that  of  her  predecessor  ;  but 
her  recantation  had  this  peculiarity,  that  it  showed,  little  to 
Mr.  Child's  credit,  the  mode  by  which  she  was  induced  to  put 
her  statements  in  writing : 

"  Most  Reverend  Father  in  God, — I  write  these  few  lines  to 
say  I  am  sorry  that  Mr.  Child  should  have  taken  things  in  such 
a  wrong  meaning  ;  the  questions  that  Mr.  Prynne  asked  me  was 
only  in  my  first  confession,  and  then  it  was  something  that  I  con- 
fessed. .  .  .  Mr.  Prynne  never  told  me  to  lie  on  the  hearthstone, 
but  I  wrote,  and  I  was  so  terrified  that  I  do  not  remember  scarcely 
anything  I  put  down  and  am  heartily  sorry  I  should  have  told 
such  falsehoods  about  Mr.  Prynne,  who  have  been  so  kind  to  me ; 
and  Mr.  Child  asked  about  the  questions  without  asking  me  if 
there  was  any  reason  for  Mr.  Prynne  asking  me  those  questions. 
If  I  had  known  that  Mr.  Child  was  going  to  make  any  use  of  it 
I  should  not  have  written  it,  but  I  was  not  aware  of  it  at  the 
time.  I  was  greatly  hurried  about  writing  because  Mr.  Child 
wanted  it." 

It  is  needless  to  say  that  the  charge  against  Mr.  Prynne  broke 
completely  down,  and  so  also  that  of  the  Sisters  compelling 
the  orphans  to  go  to  confession. 

There  is  this  to  be  said  of  Mr.  Child,  that  he  did  show  some 
signs  of  being  ashamed  of  the  pitiful  part  he  had  played  in  this 
affair.1 

The  exculpation  of  Mr.  Prynne  disappointed  and  exasperated 
the  Protestant  fanatics;  and  now  Mr.  Latimer,  the  proprietor 
1  The  Guardian,  October  6,  1852. 


224 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


and  publisher  of  an  Exeter  paper,  in  a  violent  and  scurrilous 
article  attacked  the  Vicar  of  S.  Peter's,  making  libellous  accusa- 
tions against  him.  By  the  advice  of  the  Bishop  and  his  wife's 
relations,  Mr.  Prynne,  very  reluctantly,  took  legal  action  against 
Latimer.  The  action  was  heard  in  Exeter.  Prynne  thus  de- 
scribed what  took  place  :  "  The  court  was  crowded,  but  in  that 
crowd  I  could  only  see  some  half  a  dozen  friendly  faces.  The 
large  majority  seemed  to  look  upon  me  with  dislike  and  suspicion. 
The  jury,  as  I  afterwards  learned,  was  composed  almost  entirely 
of  Dissenters.  The  case  did  not  last  long,  but  my  friends  seemed 
satisfied  that  the  evidence  had  entirely  proved  the  libellous 
nature  of  the  statements  against  me,  and  the  judge's  summing 
up  confirmed  this  view.  Indeed,  when  the  jury  left  the  room, 
the  judge,  much  to  my  astonishment,  shook  hands  with  me,  and 
congratulated  me  on  my  evidence,  and  the  course  the  action 
had  taken.  When,  shortly  after,  the  jury  returned  with  a 
verdict  for  the  defendant,  those  present  seemed  too  surprised 
to  utter  a  sound,  but  in  a  few  seconds  the  majority  commenced 
to  cheer  and  clap  their  hands.  The  judge  seemed  very  indignant, 
and  at  once  ordered  silence." 

The  costs  of  the  action  were  heavy,  and  as  Prynne  was  unable 
to  bear  them,  everything  that  he  had  that  was  of  value  was 
sold  by  auction,  down  to  the  cradle  of  his  infant  son,  who  had 
in  lieu  to  be  put  to  bed  in  a  drawer. 

Years  passed.  In  1882  the  noble  new  church  of  S.  Peter 
rose  where  had  stood  Eldad  Chapel,  and  in  1884  Mr.  Prynne  was 
elected  proctor  to  Convocation. 

On  Sunday,  January  12,  1913,  the  Mayor  and  Corporation  of 
Plymouth  in  their  robes  and  in  procession  attended  the  High 
Celebration  at  S.  Peter's  Church. 

In  1846  John  Mason  Neale  was  appointed  Warden  of  Sackville 
College,  an  almshouse  attached  to  an  old  mansion  of  the  Sack- 
ville family,  that  gave  him  apartments  for  himself  and  family, 
and  an  income  of  £28  per  annum.  As  there  was  a  chapel,  and 
according  to  the  statutes  of  the  almshouse  daily  prayer  must 
be  said  in  it,  Neale  was  desirous  of  obtaining  the  licence  of 
the  Bishop  of  Chichester,  Dr.  Gilbert.  But  the  patron,  Lord  De 
la  Warre,  objected  that  the  College  was  extra-parochial,  and 
that  the  soliciting  for  a  licence  was  tantamount  to  surrender 
of  its  liberties.  Mr.  Neale  found  the  almshouse  in  a  deplorable 
state  of  decay,  the  hall  and  the  chapel  ruinous,  and  he  persuaded 
Lord  De  la  Warre  to  rebuild  the  hall,  and  he  himself  reseated 


SACKVILLE  COLLEGE  CHAPEL 

AS   IT  WAS  IN  1847 


ROUGH  WEATHER 


225 


the  chapel.  On  the  altar  were  cross  and  candles  and  flower 
vases.  In  the  College,  Mr.  Neale  had  a  celebration  of  the  Holy 
Communion  on  Sundays  early  (9.30),  and  Matins  and  Evensong 
daily ;  but  on  Sundays  for  Morning  and  Evening  Prayer  he  and 
the  brethren  and  sisters  of  the  College  went  to  the  Parish  Church. 
On  the  first  Sunday  of  the  month,  when  there  was  a  celebration 
of  the  Holy  Communion  in  the  Parish  Church,  there  was  none 
in  the  chapel  of  Sackville  College. 

Complaints  were  made  to  Bishop  Gilbert  of  the  High-Church 
proceedings  of  Mr.  Neale,  and  he  proceeded  to  pay  a  visit  to  the 
chapel  after  holding  a  Confirmation  at  East  Grinstead  in  April 
1847,  in  company  with  the  complainant.  As  the  Bishop  entered 
and  looked  at  the  East  end,  he  said :  "I  am  not  here  with 
visitatorial  authority  ;  if  I  were  I  should  sweep  away  all  that  " — ■ 
pointing  to  the  altar. 

J.M.N.    "  The  Altar,  my  Lord  ?  " 

Bishop.  "  I  know  nothing  of  Altars.  The  Church  of  England 
knows  nothing  of  Altars  or  Sacrifices.  I  would  retain  a  decent 
low  table.  I  would  not  feed  Christ's  little  ones  with  the  wood 
of  the  cross." 

J.M.N.  "  You  would  retain  the  table  ?  " 

Bishop.  "  I  have  said  so  already.  But,  to  be  candid  with  you — 
all  that  our  Church  does  not  authorize,  she  prohibits.  But,  as 
I  have  said,  I  have  no  visitatorial  authority." 

A  few  days  later  the  Bishop  launched  the  inhibition.  "  I  feel 
it  to  be  my  duty  to  inhibit  you,  and  I  do  hereby  inhibit  you,  from 
celebrating  Divine  Worship,  and  from  the  exercise  of  clerical 
functions  in  my  diocese."  To  that  was  added  a  letter :  "I 
cannot  transmit  to  you  the  following  inhibition  without  adding 
a  fervent  prayer  that  God  may  be  pleased  to  open  your  eyes  to 
the  dishonour  done  to  Him  by  .  .  .  presenting  to  the  eyes  and 
thoughts  of  worshippers  the  frippery  with  which  you  have  trans- 
formed the  simplicity  of  the  chapel  at  Sackville  College  into  an 
imitation  of  the  degrading  superstitions  of  an  erroneous  Church." 

Now,  somewhat  later,  I  have  myself  seen  the  identical  Dr. 
Gilbert,  Bishop  of  Chichester,  at  Hurstpierpoint  College,  worship- 
ping in  the  temporary  chapel,  where  every  one  of  the  things  for 
which  Neale  was  suspended  existed — cross,  candles,  flowers — 
and  he  made  no  objection.  Lord  De  la  Warre  claimed  that  the 
chapel  at  Sackville  College  was  not  under  Episcopal  jurisdiction, 
was  in  fact  a  peculiar ;  and  a  suit  was  tried,  but  badly  defended 
and  lost,  so  that  Neale  was  inhibited  from  saying  daily  prayer 
15 


226 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


in  the  chapel,  from  preaching  and  the  celebration  of  Holy 
Communion  for  sixteen  years. 

Mr.  Neale  was  not  only  a  man  of  wide  and  brilliant  scholarship  ; 
he  was  the  most  learned  ecclesiologist  and  liturgiologist  we  had 
at  the  time  in  England  ;  his  History  of  the  Holy  Eastern  Church 
is  a  classical  work,  and  his  hymns  are  to  be  found  in  every 
Anglican  Church  hymnal,  and  are  used  in  Dissenting  meeting- 
houses as  well.  Bishop  Wilberforce  in  vain  strove  to  obtain  from 
Bishop  Gilbert  a  removal  of  the  inhibition,  which  was  a  scandal. 

In  the  early  part  of  1851,  a  Mrs.  Aulchim  died  in  the  College, 
to  which  she  had  been  admitted  at  her  own  entreaty.  For 
the  burial  of  the  old  folk  of  the  Almshouse  a  bier  and  a  pall  had 
been  provided.  The  usual  custom  was  for  the  coffin  to  be  carried 
on  the  shoulders  of  bearers.  Obviously  it  would  be  safer  in 
many  cases  that  it  should  be  borne  on  a  bier.  The  pall  was 
purple,  with  a  small  white  cross  worked  in  the  midst. 

The  relations  of  Mrs.  Aulchim,  at  the  head  of  a  rabble,  came 
to  the  College  and  demanded  to  be  admitted,  so  as  to  carry  off 
the  body  in  their  own  way,  sans  bier  and  pall.  As  they  were 
threatening,  in  place  of  giving  them  admission,  the  coffin  was 
taken  outside  the  gates  and  delivered  over  to  the  relations. 
These  at  once  conveyed  it  to  a  public-house  and  opened  it 
there,  to  make  sure  that  the  body  was  in  it,  and  then  proceeded 
to  the  churchyard. 

That  night  a  mob  of  about  a  hundred  and  fifty  persons,  many 
of  them  disguised,  paraded  the  town,  bearing  shavings,  straw 
and  other  combustibles,  then  proceeded  to  the  College,  where 
they  made  a  bonfire  on  which  they  burnt  crosses,  a  bier  and  a 
pall.  Not  content  with  that,  they  threw  stones  at  the  windows 
and  smashed  the  panes  of  glass.  Then,  after  returning  to  the 
town,  where  they  were  regaled  with  beer,  they  went  back  by  the 
College  and  endeavoured  to  set  fire  to  the  Warden's  house,  melting 
the  lead  of  the  casement  of  one  window  and  the  flames  leaping 
above  the  roof.  When  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Neale  went  out  to  speak 
to  the  rioters,  they  were  both  attacked,  and  obliged  to  take 
refuge  behind  barricaded  doors. 

There  was  again  a  riot  in  1856,  but  the  most  serious  one  took 
place  in  1857  at  Lewes. 

A  Miss  Scobell,  daughter  of  the  Rev.  John  Scobell,  the  in- 
cumbent of  All  Saints',  Lewes,  had  had  her  life  at  home  rendered 
intolerable  by  her  father's  dislike,  and  consequent  unkindness. 
As  he  became  insane  later  on,  and  died  in  this  condition,  this  may 


ROUGH  WEATHER 


227 


explain  the  barbarity  of  his  conduct  to  his  child.  She  took 
refuge  in  S.  Margaret's  Sisterhood,  that  Mr.  Neale  had  founded, 
after  having  spent  some  years  drifting  about  from  one  friend's 
house  to  another.  She  entered  the  Sisterhood  in  the  autumn 
of  1857,  and  in  nursing  a  case  of  scarlet  fever  caught  the  infection 
and  died,  only  nine  weeks  after  putting  on  her  Sister's  dress.1 
I  will  quote  what  followed  from  Mr.  Neale's  own  account  :— 
"  On  her  deathbed,  having  appointed  the  Superior  of  S.  Mar- 
garet's and  myself  her  executors,  she  expressed  a  wish  to  be 
buried  in  the  family  vault  in  the  churchyard  of  her  father,  and 
that  the  funeral  should  be  conducted  in  the  way  which  she 
considered  most  proper  and  most  Christian.  On  mentioning 
these  wishes  to  her  father  on  his  arrival  (which  did  not  take  place 
till  after  her  death)  he  immediately  acquiesced  in  both,  expressed 
his  willingness  that  she  should  be  followed  to  the  grave  by  the 
other  Sisters,  and  charged  himself  with  all  the  arrangements  at 
Lewes. 

"  Contrary  to  what  would  have  been  our  wish,  and  much  to 
our  inconvenience,  he  asked  that  the  funeral  might  take  place 
in  the  evening  ;  it  was  therefore  fixed  for  5.30  p.m.  On  our 
arrival  at  Lewes  the  usual  procession  was  formed,  the  bier  pre- 
ceded, myself  and  the  Sisters  followed  ;  the  only  thing  beyond 
an  ordinary  funeral  being  a  wreath  of  white  flowers  carried  by  an 
orphan  child  from  S.  Margaret's — unless  I  need  mention  a  white 
pall,  but  so  trimmed  with  black  as  to  be  perfectly  inconspicuous 
in  the  twilight. 

"  The  churchyard  lies  about  a  hundred  yards  from  the  station. 
Before  reaching  it,  we  were  joined  by  Mr.  Scobell  himself  and 
three  members  of  his  family,  who  proceeded  to  take  their  places 
between  ourselves  and  the  bier.  The  Service  in  the  Church 
was  read  by  Mr.  Hutchinson  of  West  Firle  ;  the  uproar,  hooting 
and  yelling  in  the  churchyard,  most  evidently  preconcerted, 
and  with  considerable  skill,  being  quite  alarming.  With  some 
difficulty  we  made  our  way  to  the  vault  in  the  bank  of  the  north 
side  of  the  churchyard.  Mr.  Hutchinson  entered  the  vault, 
and  the  service  was  there  concluded,  the  mob  every  moment 
growing  fiercer  and  more  threatening.    They  made  way,  however, 

1  Miss  Scobell  was  aged  twenty-seven,  and  had  from  ^5,000  to  ^6,000 
left  her  by  her  mother.  She  left  the  bulk  of  her  property  to  a  favourite 
brother,  and  only  ^400  to  the  Sisterhood.  On  one  occasion  her  father 
had  locked  the  door  on  her  and  himself,  wrenched  the  keys  of  her  desk 
from  her,  opened  it  and  produced  her  diary  and  notes  for  confession,  and 
read  them  out  before  her  sisters. 


228 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


for  Mr.  Scobell  and  family,  as  well  as  for  Mr.  Hutchinson.  As 
the  former  was  passing,  I  stepped  up  to  him  and  said,  1  Mr. 
Scobell,  you  see  how  threatening  the  mob  are :  will  you  not 
protect  the  Sisters  ?  '  He  bowed  and  passed  on,  and  that,  be 
it  remembered,  when  his  daughter  had  died  in  their  arms  only 
five  days  previously.  While  this  was  passing  the  lights  were 
either  extinguished,  or  so  flashed  in  our  faces  as  to  make  a 
confusion  worse  than  darkness.  There  was  a  cry  of  '  Do  your 
duty  !  Now  the  performance  is  to  come  off !  '  and  a  rush 
was  immediately  made  upon  us.  But  the  strangest  part  of  all 
was  that  men,  certainly  in  the  dress  of  gentlemen,  could  stand 
by  and  see  ladies  dashed  this  way  and  that,  their  veils  dragged 
off  and  their  dresses  torn,  and,  far  from  rendering  the  least 
assistance,  could  actually  excite  the  dregs  of  the  rabble  to 
further  violence.  I  was  myself  knocked  down,  and,  for  a 
moment,  while  under  the  feet  of  the  mob,  gave  myself  up  for 
lost.  We  were  borne  along  into  the  street — Mr.  Scobell  having 
quietly  gone  home,  and  taking  no  further  interest  in  the  matter. 
Some  of  the  Sisters  took  refuge  in  the  schoolmaster's  house, 
some,  with  myself,  in  a  little  public-house  called  the  King's 
Head.  Round  this  inn  the  mob  soon  gathered,  and  were  with 
great  difficulty  prevented  from  breaking  in.  At  last,  by  the 
advice  of  the  police,  I  made  my  way  across  gardens  and  over 
walls  to  the  station  :  a  larger  force  having  been  now  got  together, 
was  sent  back  with  a  fly  to  the  King's  Head,  and  there,  after 
some  hard  fighting  on  their  part,  we  were  enabled  to  return 
to  East  Grinstead  by  the  next  train,  the  rabble  besetting  the 
station  to  the  very  last." 

Sister  Amy's  father  published  his  own  account  of  the  trans- 
action, representing  Mr.  Neale  in  the  most  odious  light,  and  his 
daughter  as  having  been  trapped  and  deluded,  and  finally 
placed  in  the  way  of  infection,  that  her  small  property  might, 
at  her  death,  fall  into  the  hands  of  her  new  friends,  who,  it  was 
reported,  had  induced  her  to  make  her  will  in  that  sense.  The 
Bishop  at  once  withdrew  from  his  post  as  Visitor  of  S.  Mar- 
garet's, and  published  a  letter  addressed  to  the  Superior  in 
which  he  stated  that  he  entirely  withheld  countenance  and 
approval  of  the  Community. 

Mr.  Scobell's  pamphlet  contained  a  tissue  of  false  representa- 
tions, which  could  be  categorically  disproved  by  letters  and  by 
personal  evidence.  The  Mother  Superior,  taking  with  her  the 
necessary  documents,  at  once  went  to  Chichester  and  requested 


ROUGH  WEATHER 


229 


an  interview  with  the  Bishop.  It  was  peremptorily  refused. 
She  offered  to  wait  his  Lordship's  time,  and  urged  the  import- 
ance of  her  communication  and  what  she  had  to  lay  before 
him.  For  all  reply  she  was  informed  by  the  butler  that  till 
she  quitted  the  apartment  into  which  she  had  been  shown  his 
Lordship  would  be  unable  to  interview  any  one  else.  That 
any  one,  be  his  rank  and  station  what  it  may,  should  thus  re- 
pulse a  lady  whose  only  object  in  requesting  an  interview  was 
to  set  herself  right  in  his  good  opinion,  is  simply  astounding. 

Bishop  Forbes  of  Brechin  wrote  :  "  Twenty  years  hence  the 
people  of  Lewes  will  kiss  the  dust  off  the  Sisters'  feet."  This 
came  almost  literally  true,  at  that  interval  of  time,  on  the 
occasion  of  their  nursing  the  poor  of  Lewes  during  a  serious 
outbreak  of  fever  in  the  town,  some  twenty  years  after. 

In  i860  Bishop  Gilbert  virtually,  in  1863  formally,  revoked 
the  inhibition  laid  on  Mr.  Neale  in  1847. 

The  first  church  in  London  in  which  services  of  a  tolerably 
advanced  class  were  started  was  S.  Barnabas,  Pimlico,  if  we 
put  aside  Margaret  Street  Chapel,  where  was  Mr.  Oakeley  in 
1839.  This  latter,  during  the  French  Revolution,  had  been  a 
kind  of  temple  of  Deism.  It  then  passed  into  the  hands  of 
the  Irvingites,  and  finally  became  an  Anglican  chapel-of-ease. 
Galleries  skirted  the  walls,  pews  blocked  up  the  area.  Sanctuary 
was  none  ;  but  immediately  in  front  of  the  Communion  Table 
was  a  three-decker.  Mr.  Oakeley  swept  these  abominations 
away,  and  made  the  chapel — that  was  really  not  much  more 
than  a  long  room — to  look  churchlike.  The  altar  was  given  a 
crimson  frontal,  cross  and  candlesticks,  whose  unlighted  candles 
stood  memorials  of  episcopal  inflexibility,  and  emblems  of 
patient  hope.  They  were  only  lighted  when  the  fog  came  down 
thick  and  rendered  necessary  some  artificial  light.  But  Margaret 
Street  Chapel  was  a  very  small  affair.  There  was  a  later 
temporary  chapel,  of  much  the  same  character,  in  which  the 
Rev.  Upton  Richards  officiated.  I  can  recall  it  in  the  old 
days  before  All  Saints'  Church  was  built. 

The  parish  of  S.  Paul's,  Knightsbridge,  comprised  a  narrow 
strip  of  land  a  mile  and  a  quarter  in  length,  containing  in  1840 
a  population  of  about  12,000  souls.  It  comprised  the  extremes 
of  wealth  and  poverty.  At  the  farther  end,  "  Nell  Gwynn's 
Court  "  and  "  New  Grosvenor  Place  "  were  noted  for  their 
squalor.  There  the  Grosvenor  Canal  was  little  better  than  an 
open  sewer.    The  houses  were  old  and  ruinous,  and  the  streets 


230 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


unpaved.  This  district  was  occupied  by  the  scum  of  society. 
The  small  beershops  were  rendezvous  of  the  veriest  dregs  of  the 
people.  Here  Mr.  Bennett,  the  incumbent  of  S.  Paul's,  Knights- 
bridge,  resolved  on  building  a  church,  schools,  and  a  clergy 
house,  and  in  these  he  purposed  carrying  out  the  principles  of 
the  Oxford  Movement.  By  1848  the  group  of  buildings  was 
completed  at  the  cost  of  £30,000.  Who  can  tell  now  what  self- 
sacrifices  had  been  undergone  to  raise  this  sum !  As  Mr.  Bennett 
wrote  in  his  farewell  letter  :  "  Every  window  has  its  tale  of  some 
noble  heart  that,  yearning  for  His  glory,  has  here  laid  his  sub- 
stance and  his  love  to  be  set  forth.  It  is  the  noble  and  the 
poor  together — faithful  women  and  little  children  together — 
here  all  in  one  contributed.  Each  window  marks  a  story  known 
not  to  you,  but  only  to  me  and  God.  Do  you  see  the  most  holy 
place,  this  altar  and  all  that  lies  upon  it — the  holy  vessels,  the 
vestments,  the  various  preparations  for  the  holy  sacrifice  ? 
There  is  not  one,  no,  not  one  single  holy  thing  there  lying  in  its 
sacred  use  but  swells  up  the  bursting  heart  into  a  memory  of 
some  deed  of  love  of  those  by  me,  their  pastor,  best  loved  in 
this  wide  world  of  sin  :  there  are  some  gifts  of  penitents,  gladly 
by  their  almsgiving  showing  forth  contrition  for  a  youth  of 
sin,  now  lately  learning  what  they  never  knew  before  ;  here 
gifts  of  the  innocent  in  Christ — babes  who  yet  have  known  but 
little  save  to  love,  guarded  by  their  angels  standing  before  God 
in  Heaven.  I  know  each  name.  This  is  the  font — there  is 
not  a  chisel-mark  there  but  calls  to  mind  the  anxious  hoarded 
alms  and  treasured  sacrifice  of  her  who  laid  it  there  for  God's 
eternal  use." 

At  the  Consecration  the  only  thing  to  which  Bishop  Blom- 
field  objected  was  the  flowers  on  the  altar. 

On  September  24,  1850,  the  Pope  issued  a  Bull  appointing 
bishops  of  the  Roman  Communion  with  titles  from  sees  in 
England  instead  of  Vicars  Apostolic,  who  had  previously  acted 
in  some  such  capacity.  At  once,  all  England  was  in  an  uproar 
over  this  so-called  "  Papal  Aggression."  Lord  John  Russell 
issued  his  "  Durham  Letter,"  in  which  he  cast  the  blame  upon 
the  "  Puseyites,"  fanned  the  excitement  of  the  people,  and 
directed  it  against  the  Tractarian  Clergy.  Punch  had  a  cartoon 
representing  Lord  John  as  a  naughty  boy  chalking  up  "No 
Popery  "  on  a  wall,  and  then  running  away.  This  was  followed 
by  the  Guildhall  dinner,  at  which  Judges  and  Ministers  de- 
nounced the  High-Church  clergy  in  no  measured  terms,  and 


ROUGH  WEATHER 


231 


called  on  the  people  of  England  to  rise  in  their  might  and  put 
them  down. 

The  people  in  Pimlico  and  its  neighbourhood  took  them  at 
their  word  and  sent  to  the  Bishop  denunciations  of  the  practices 
at  S.  Barnabas.  He  was  frightened,  wrote  to  Mr.  Bennett 
and  ordered  him  to  give  up  the  practices  that  gave  offence. 
This  Mr.  Bennett  refused  to  do,  and  unguardedly  told  the 
Bishop  that  if  he  regarded  him  as  unfaithful  to  the  spirit  of 
the  Church  of  England,  he  would  resign  his  cure.  Then  ensued 
a  succession  of  riots  in  and  about  the  church,  and  the  chancel 
would  have  been  invaded  and  wrecked,  but  for  a  cordon  of 
faithful  men  who  stood  before  the  screen  gates  and  defended 
them.  The  riots  began  on  November  10  and  continued  till 
December  8.  On  this  last  day  the  climax  was  reached,  and 
there  seemed  every  prospect  of  the  rioters  gutting  the  church, 
when  Mr.  Bennett  mounted  the  pulpit  and  spoke  with  such  fire, 
such  heart-searching  words  as  to  overawe  the  mob,  and  send 
most  of  them  out  of  church  with  abashed  countenances.  The 
Bishop  now  demanded  of  Mr.  Bennett  that  he  should  resign,  as 
he  had  undertaken.  In  vain  did  the  poor  people  of  the  parish 
appeal  to  Bishop  Blomfield — he  would  neither  receive  their  depu- 
tation nor  answer  their  appeal ;  and  Mr.  Bennett  resigned,  to  be 
at  once  appointed  Vicar  of  Frome  Selwood  by  the  Marchioness 
of  Bath  ;  and  the  Hon.  and  Rev.  R.  Liddell  was  appointed  in 
his  room  at  S.  Paul's.  The  services  at  S.  Barnabas  were  con- 
tinued as  before,  and  it  was  some  time  before  the  riots  ceased. 

I  knew  S.  Barnabas  intimately  when  Mr.  Skinner  was  vicar 
and  Mr.  Lowder  and  Mr.  Lyford  were  curates,  and  I  was  wont 
to  stay  in  the  clergy-house.  Little  by  little  the  clouds  rolled 
away,  and  now  all  there  is  peace  and  prosperity. 


CHAPTER  X 


STURM  UND  DRANG 

THE  S.  George 's-in-the-East  riots  began  in  1859,  anc* 
continued  until  i860.1  They  took  place  in  the  church. 
They  originated  with  a  Mr.  Allen,  incumbent  of  S.  Jude's, 
Whitechapel,  who  had  obtained  a  position  in  S.  George's 
as  lecturer,  independent  of  the  rector,  the  Rev.  Bryan  King, 
and  they  began  when  the  latter  was  abroad  for  his  health. 
Allen  was  a  violent  Protestant,  and,  urged  by  his  intemperate 
language,  a  few  malcontents  began  to  interrupt  the  services 
in  the  church.  This  speedily  grew  in  intensity  and  violence. 
Disorderly  interruptions  were  organized  and  systematically 
carried  on  week  after  week,  whilst  the  proper  authorities  were 
indifferent,  and  took  no  active  means  to  suppress  them.  One 
Sunday  afternoon,  overcome  by  the  horror  of  what  was  going 
on,  the  curate  fell  down  in  a  fit  in  the  midst  of  the  service, 
whereupon  ensued  a  hideous  row,  and  fighting.  That  the  dis- 
turbances were  organized  admitted  of  no  doubt,  for  fuglemen 
were  posted  about  the  church  in  the  pews  and  in  the  galleries, 
who  gave  signals  for  the  hooting  and  profane  shouts.  Hand- 
bills were  placarded  about  the  streets,  containing  much  exciting 
language,  the  last  being  in  the  form  of  dissuasion:  "Do  not 
groan,  do  not  hiss,  do  not  pull  the  popish  rags  off  his  back;  " 
and  Mr.  Allen  was  generally  held  to  have  written  these — at  all 
events  he  never  repudiated  them. 

I  was  wont  to  visit  S.  George's-in-the-East,  as  I  was  a  friend 
of  the  brother  of  Mrs.  Bryan  King,  and  I  was  there  when  the 
rector  had  returned.  As  far  as  I  could  see,  there  was  nothing 
in  the  church  that  might  reasonably  be  objected  to.  At  Evensong 
a  pair  of  candles  lighted,  a  surpliced  choir  in  the  stalls,  and  the 
surplice  worn  in  the  pulpit. 

Directly  the  doors  were  opened,  the  mob  surged  into  the 
church,  scrambling  into  the  pews,  some  over  their  backs,  and 

1  See  for  further  particulars  :  C.  F.  Lowder,  a  Biography  (London,  1881). 

232 


STURM  UND  DRANG 


233 


into  the  galleries.  Police  were  stationed  down  the  middle  pas- 
sage, but  had  been  given  orders  to  do  nothing  unless  personal 
violence  were  offered.  There  ensued  talking,  laughing,  and 
cracking  of  vulgar  jokes  before  the  service  began. 

When  the  choir  and  clergy  entered,  there  burst  forth  booing 
and  hooting,  and  during  the  service  unseemly  mimicry  of  the 
intoning,  and  indecent  parodies  chanted  as  responses.  When  the 
choir  turned  East  at  the  Creed,  the  mob  turned  bodily  west. 
I  felt,  when  I  was  there,  that  the  Rev.  Bryan  King  made  a 
mistake  in  proceeding  with  Evensong,  after  the  disturbance 
had  begun.  He  should,  in  my  opinion,  have  stopped  at  once, 
and  left  with  the  choir.  We  are  forbidden  to  give  that  which  is 
holy  to  dogs,  and  cast  our  pearls  before  swine.  A  great  number 
of  those  who  invaded  the  church  came  with  Mr.  Allen  from 
Whitechapel,  and  it  was  obvious  from  their  faces  they  were 
mere  hooligans,  as  we  should  now  term  them. 

Before  Mr.  Bryan  King  became  rector  of  S.  George's,  his 
predecessor  had  appeared  once  only  in  the  parish  church  during 
the  seven  preceding  years,  and  had  only  one  curate.  After 
fifteen  years  of  hard  and  hopeless  work  by  Mr.  King,  the  Rev. 
Charles  Lowder  came  to  his  help  and  started  a  mission  church 
in  Wellclose  Square.  In  1859  s*x  clergymen  at  least  were 
labouring  in  the  parish,  besides  a  large  staff  of  lay  assistants, 
and  six  hundred  children  were  under  instruction  in  the  schools 
that  had  been  set  on  foot.  No  wonder  the  cry  arose  that  Mr. 
King  had  "  alienated  "  his  parishioners.  A  letter  from  one, 
signing  himself  "an  Englishman,"  was  published  as  a  pamphlet 
at  this  time,  addressed  to  Lord  Brougham.  "  Alienation  indeed !  " 
he  exclaims:  "  what  more  convincing  evidence  of  the  depth  and 
reality  of  the  work  now  being  carried  on  at  S.  George's  than  the 
rancorous  hostility  which  it  encountered  from  the  advocates 
and  doers  of  Satan's  work  in  that  benighted  parish  ?  The 
parishioners  were  quiet  enough  so  long  as  the  one  curate  with 
his  four  services  a  week  feebly  essayed  to  arrest  the  over- 
whelming tide  of  vice  and  crime ;  but,  now  that  the  Rector  of 
S.  George's  has  directed  a  more  powerful  armament  against 
the  stronghold  of  sin,  its  defenders  cry  out  like  Demetrius  of 
Ephesus,  for  their  '  craft  is  in  danger.'  " 

For  ten  months  the  riots  in  the  church  continued.  During 
a  part  of  that  time  the  police  were  withdrawn.  On  August  14, 
1859,  tne  cry  was  raised,  "  Let  us  attack  the  choir  boys  !  "  and 
a  rush  was  made  to  assault  them.    One  of  the  few  friends  of 


234 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


order  who  was  endeavouring  to  protect  them,  as  they  fled  to 
the  vestry,  knocked  off  the  hat  of  one  of  the  assailants,  for 
which  he  was  prosecuted  by  the  publican  churchwarden,  the 
vestry  paying  the  expenses  of  the  prosecution.  In  the  middle 
of  August  both  Mr.  King  and  his  curate  broke  down,  their 
health  gave  way,  and  they  left  S.  George's  for  a  time,  when  the 
whole  burden  of  the  services  in  the  parish  church  fell  upon  the 
Mission  clergy ;  and  as  these  had  to  come  from  and  return  to 
their  house  in  Calvert  Street,  they  were  exposed  all  the  way 
to  the  insults  and  personal  violence  of  the  mob  in  the  street.  A 
pathetic  incident  is  connected  with  this,  which  Mr.  Lowder 
thus  describes  :  "  When  the  Mission  clergy  assisted  the  rector 
in  his  time  of  need,  and  were  themselves  in  considerable  danger 
from  the  mob,  while  returning  from  the  church  to  the  Mission- 
house,  we  generally  found  on  our  way  home  a  little  girl  from 
the  school,  trotting  close  by  our  side,  as  though  to  protect  us 
from  the  violence  of  the  people,  who  were  pressing  and  shouting 
around  us.  She  would  take  up  her  position  near  the  church, 
and  often  wait  a  long  time  until  we  appeared  ;  and  if  we  did 
not  recognize  her  before,  we  soon  heard  a  little  voice  by  our 
side,  addressing  us  by  name  to  show  that  she  was  near.  The 
child,  a  wild  little  thing,  living  in  an  unfavourable  atmosphere 
at  home,  was  afterwards  taken  into  S.  Stephen's  Home  and 
sent  out  to  service,  and  is  now  married." 

The  Bishop  of  London  did  nothing  to  stop  the  profanity, 
save,  as  we  shall  see,  to  counsel,  nay,  command  submission  to 
the  demands  of  the  rioters.  Appeal  was  made  in  vain  to  Sir 
George  Cornewall  Lewis,  who  at  that  time  was  the  head  of  the 
Home  Office.  Mr.  Mackonochie,  a  curate,  had  a  personal  inter- 
view with  Mr.  Waddington,  the  Under  Secretary,  from  whom  he 
got  no  further  satisfaction  than  that  doubtless  instructions  had 
already  been  given  to  the  police.  What  these  instructions 
were  we  have  already  seen. 

The  disturbances  started  by  Mr.  Allen  were  organized  by 
publicans  and  brothel-keepers,1  who  found  that  the  apostolic 
labours  of  the  clergy  menaced  their  trades.  But  it  is  almost 
certain  that  there  were  men  of  means  and  position,  outsiders, 
who  fomented  the  riots,  for  money  circulated  freely  among 
the  disturbers  of  the  service.  According  to  the  late  Mr.  J.  M. 
Ludlow,  the  riots  were  "  largely  stimulated  by  the  Jewish 

1  One  of  the  ringleaders  was  fined  at  the  Middlesex  Sessions  for  keeping 
several  houses  of  ill-fame. 


STURM  UND  DRANG 


235 


sweaters,  whose  proceedings  Mr.  Bryan  King's  curates,  Messrs. 
Mackonochie  and  Lowder,  had  the  unheard-of  temerity  to 
denounce  and  interfere  with."  There  could  be  no  mistaking 
the  Hebrew  cast  of  countenance  of  many  of  the  young  men 
who  created  the  disturbances  and  carried  them  on  with  most 
persistence. 

On  February  26,  i860,  and  March  4,  the  mob  took  possession 
of  the  choir  stalls,  pelted  and  defaced  the  altar  hangings  with 
orange-peel  and  bread-and-butter,  and  overthrew  the  altar 
cross.  The  Bishop  sent  a  manifesto  to  the  churchwardens  to 
remove  the  choir  stalls,  the  altar  hangings  and  the  cross.  These 
men  gladly  carried  out  the  injunctions,  and  all  the  special 
objects  of  the  rioters'  hate  were  swept  away.  The  clergy,  now 
deprived  of  their  stalls,  had  retreated  to  some  deal  forms,  placed 
within  the  altar  rails,  as  the  only  place  left  free  for  them ;  but 
the  mob  invaded  the  sanctuary  and  took  possession  of  the 
seats  for  the  clergy  and  choristers.  On  the  following  Saturday, 
May  19,  an  order  arrived  from  the  Bishop  desiring  the  church- 
wardens to  remove  the  forms  that  had  been  placed  within  the 
rails  for  the  accommodation  of  the  clergy,  and  to  place  these 
latter  anywhere  about  the  church  wherever  the  churchwardens 
listed. 

The  question  of  ritual  really  did  not  enter  into  the  considera- 
tion of  the  disturbers  of  divine  worship.  As  Mr.  Rowley,  who 
afterwards  went  with  Bishop  Mackenzie  to  South  Africa,  and 
was  then  in  charge  of  a  boys'  school  in  Old  Gravel  Lane,  wrote  : 
"  The  character  of  some  of  these  men  was  thus  set  forth  by  a 
young  man  who  attended  the  night  school  in  the  Calvert  Street 
district  :  'It's  all  a  question  of  beer,  sir,  and  what  else  they 
can  get.  We  know  them.  They  are  blackguards,  like  our- 
selves here.  Religion  ain't  anything  more  to  them  than  it  is 
to  us.  They  gets  paid  for  what  they  do,  and  they  do  it,  like 
they'd  do  any  other  job." 

It  was  in  vain  that  Bishop  Tait  was  entreated  to  come  down 
and  judge  for  himself,  and  speak  to  the  people.  He  preferred 
to  remain  comfortably  in  his  palace  at  Fulham. 

The  story  of  the  riots  may  be  concluded  in  the  words  of 
the  "  Englishman  "  already  mentioned,  written  in  April  i860. 
"  Nearly  every  point  assailed  has  been  (unwisely,  I  think) 
surrendered  for  the  sake  of  peace.  .  .  .  And  what  has  been  the 
result  ?  Why,  that  the  state  of  things  is  as  bad,  if  not  worse, 
than  ever  it  was.    A  pretty  close  attendant  at  the  services  at 


236 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


S.  George's  for  some  months,  I  will  venture  to  say  that  the 
scene  of  riot  and  blasphemy  on  Sunday,  the  8th  of  the  present 
month,  has  never  on  more  than  one  or  two  occasions  been 
equalled,  certainly  never  surpassed.  There  were  the  same  exe- 
crations, hisses  and  laughter,  the  same  bursts  of  groans  and 
howlings,  the  same  stamping  and  slamming  of  doors,  the  same 
hustling  of  the  clergy  and  maltreating  of  helpless  little  choir- 
boys, the  same  blasphemies,  the  same  profanity,  the  same 
cowardliness,  the  same  brutality  as  ever.  I  can  find  no  words 
which  more  thoroughly  express  my  sense  of  the  horrors  I  wit- 
nessed than  the  language  of  the  reports  which  appeared  in  the 
daily  journals  (all  of  them  anti-Tractarian)  on  the  following  day. 
'  It  was  left  for  last  night,'  they  say,  '  to  witness  a  series  of  the 
most  diabolical  outrages  ever  perpetrated  in  any  church.  The 
conduct  of  the  mob  was  perfectly  fiendish.'  The  most  violent 
outbreaks  generally  occur  during  the  reading  of  the  Scripture 
lessons,  the  recital  of  the  Creed,  the  chanting  of  the  '  Gloria  '  or 
the  '  Prayer  for  Bishops  and  Clergy.  .  .  .'  These  riots  are  not  a 
question  for  argument, for  concession, for  temporizing;  they  are 
a  scandal  to  be  put  down.  .  .  .  No  language  which  I  could 
employ  could  convey  a  stronger  censure  upon  each  and  all  of 
them — the  Home  Secretary,  the  Chief  Commissioner  of  Police, 
and  the  magistrates — than  the  single  fact  that,  up  to  the  very 
day  on  which  I  write,  these  atrocious  scandals,  far  from  being 
suppressed,  are  reiterated  every  Sunday  under  circumstances 
of  increased  atrocity.  .  .  .  Every  act  of  the  Bishop  of  London, 
since  his  first  intervention,  has  resulted  in  a  triumph  of  the 
rioters  over  the  Rector  of  S.  George's  ;  and  the  magistrates, 
out  of  the  dozen  of  cases  which  have  been  brought  before  them, 
have  not  punished  a  single  rioter  with  imprisonment." 

Lord  Brougham  spoke  on  the  matter  in  the  House  of  Lords  : 
"  I  beg  to  have  it  distinctly  understood  that  the  question  of 
putting  down  the  disgraceful  nuisance  has  nothing  whatever  to 
do  with  the  supposed  errors  out  of  which  these  disturbances 
have  arisen.  Be  the  clergyman  ever  so  much  in  the  wrong  (and 
I  do  not  say  that  he  is  in  the  wrong)  this  does  not  furnish  an 
atom  of  excuse,  or  even  of  extenuation,  for  such  scandalous 
exhibitions.  I  can  only  repeat  the  expressions  of  disgust  at 
these  proceedings  which  I  uttered  on  a  former  evening,  and  my 
conviction  that,  whatever  may  be  the  merits  of  the  question, 
whether  as  to  dogma  or  discipline,  it  is  not  to  be  settled  by  the 
outrages  of  a  riotous  mob." 


STURM  UND  DRANG 


237 


At  last  some  Broad  Churchmen,  Dean  Stanley,  Tom  Hughes, 
along  with  Lord  Brougham,  intervened ;  and  finally,  shamed 
by  their  remonstrances,  on  September  25  the  Bishop  (Tait) 
ordered  the  church  to  be  closed. 

Nor  was  it  only  at  S.  George  's-in-the-East  that  these  dis- 
turbances broke  out.  Amongst  other  places  was  Stoke  Ne wing- 
ton,  where  the  stately  church  of  S.  Matthias  had  been  reared 
and  a  new  parish  created  mainly  through  the  efforts  of  Mr. 
Robert  Brett.  In  this  case  there  were  undoubtedly  men  with 
money  behind  the  rioters,  and  coin  was  lavished  abundantly 
among  them.  They  broke  into  the  church  and  disturbed  the 
service,  but  there  were  present  to  receive  them  a  large  body 
of  stalwart  Churchmen,  and  they  were  ejected  from  the  sacred 
building. 

During  the  Hanoverian  period  controversy  had  raged  over 
the  fundamentals  of  religion,  assailed  by  Deists  and  Socinians, 
and  attention  had  been  drawn  away  from  the  sacramental  teach- 
ing of  the  earlier  divines  of  the  English  Church  ;  but  with  the 
Oxford  movement,  these  doctrines  were  again  brought  into 
prominence.  The  Real  Presence  and  the  Eucharistic  Sacrifice 
were  once  more  proclaimed  to  be  the  tenets  of  the  Universal 
Church  in  all  ages,  and  to  have  been  maintained  by  the  Fathers 
of  the  English  Church.  These  two  doctrines  involved  as  well 
that  of  the  priesthood,  and  to  this  both  Latitudinarian  and  Low 
Churchmen  were  especially  opposed.  The  former  regarded  the 
clergy  as  the  moral  police  of  the  State,  and  the  latter  would 
limit  them  to  be  mere  preachers  of  the  Word.  Consequently  the 
Oxford  movement  aroused  bitter  hostility  from  both  sides. 

Confession  had  been  attacked,  and  defended  by  the  Bishop  of 
Exeter  ;  at  S.  George's-in-the-East  and  elsewhere  mob  violence 
had  been  urged  against  the  restoration  of  the  common  decencies 
of  divine  worship.  Now  a  more  serious,  persistent  assault  was 
to  be  made  against  the  Eucharistic  teaching  of  the  reformers. 
It  opened  with  an  attack  made  on  Archdeacon  Denison  for 
doctrine  contained  in  two  sermons  delivered  in  Wells  Cathedral 
in  1855,  and  a  condemnation  of  it  was  obtained  in  the  Diocesan 
Court.  An  appeal  was  lodged  to  the  Provincial  Court ;  but 
eventually,  on  the  plea  that  some  legal  irregularity  had  been 
committed,  the  proceedings  were  set  aside. 

In  1871  an  attack  was  made  upon  the  Rev.  W.  J.  E.  Bennett, 
Vicar  of  Frome,  for  inculcating  the  same  doctrine;  but  again 
the  prosecutors  met  with  no  success  at  their  chosen  court,  for 


238 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


it  pronounced  that  Mr.  Bennett's  teaching  was  not  contrary  to 
that  of  the  Church  of  England. 

It  now  became  clear  to  the  Low-Church  party  that  they 
were  not  likely  to  achieve  success  in  assailing  doctrine,  and 
they  trusted  to  obtain  better  results  by  an  attack  on  ritual. 

The  Tractarians  had  done  no  more  than  teach  definitely  the 
verities  of  the  Catholic  Faith,  and  had  made  little  advance  in 
ceremonial.  But  as  congregations  had  become  educated  and 
had  their  minds  saturated  with  this  teaching,  they  began  to 
require  that  the  truths  they  had  received  should  be  exemplified 
in  worship.  Accordingly,  in  the  twenty  years  that  followed 
Newman's  secession,  High  Churchmen  in  all  parts  of  the  country 
began  to  dignify  their  altars  with  cross,  candlesticks  and  flowers, 
and  to  use  the  Eucharistic  vestments  at  Celebrations.  They  had, 
as  they  believed,  excellent  authority  in  the  Ornaments  Rubric, 
which  had  been  opposed  by  the  Presbyterians  at  the  Savoy 
Conference  precisely  on  the  grounds  that  this  rubric  did  re- 
quire the  ornaments  of  the  altar  and  the  minister  to  be  those 
that  were  in  use  and  were  ordered  by  the  First  Prayer  Book  of 
King  Edward  VI.  But  lawyers  can  always  prove  black  to  be 
white  and  the  converse,  and  on  this  the  Protestants  relied. 
They  had  formed  a  Church  Association,  and  had  subscribed 
largely  to  have  the  question  of  the  ornaments  tried  and  their 
use  condemned.  Now  it  so  happened  that  in  1832  by  Act  of 
Parliament  the  Court  of  Final  Appeal  in  matters  ecclesiastical 
had  been  transferred  to  the  Privy  Council,  and  this  had  been 
done  without  the  sanction  of  Convocation,  which  then  existed 
only  in  name.  The  Court  was  purely  secular,  founded  by  a 
purely  secular  authority.  Not  a  single  ecclesiastic  was  neces- 
sarily included  in  it.  Not  a  single  member  of  it  need  neces- 
sarily belong  to  the  Church  of  England.  It  was  never  intended 
that  questions  of  doctrine  or  ritual  should  come  before  it.  This 
was  clearly  stated  by  Lord  Brougham,  the  author  of  the  Act, 
in  the  House  of  Lords  in  1850,  when  he  said  :  "It  (the  Judicial 
Committee  of  the  Privy  Council)  was  created  for  the  considera- 
tion of  a  totally  different  class  of  cases  (from  that  of  Mr. 
Gorham)." 

This  was  not  at  first  fully  perceived  by  Churchmen,  or  they 
would  never  have  appealed  to  it  against  the  adverse  judgment 
of  the  Court  of  Arches.  Although  the  constitution  of  the  Court 
of  Final  Appeal  has  been  somewhat  modified  by  subsequent 
legislation,  it  still  remains  a  secular  court,  incompetent  to  deal 


STURM  UND  DRANG 


239 


with  spiritual  cases.    As  such,  Churchmen  cannot  plead  before 
I  it,  or  recognize  its  decisions  as  binding ;  the  fact  that  the  lower 
Courts  consider  themselves  bound  by  its  judgments  likewise 
destroys  their  authority. 

The  first  prosecutions  were  those  against  Liddell,  the  Vicar 
of  S.  Paul's,  Knight sbridge,  so  as  to  obtain  the  removal  of  the 
stone  altar,  its  cross,  candlesticks,  coloured  frontals  and  the 
credence  table  ;  and  the  same  was  objected  to  in  the  parish 
church  of  S.  Barnabas,  Pimlico. 

The  action  was  brought  before  the  Consistory  Court  of  London. 
The  decision  was  against  Mr.  Liddell  on  all  points  except  the 
candlesticks,  which  were  to  be  allowed  when  necessary  for  giving 
light.  The  decision  was  confirmed  by  the  Court  of  Arches  on 
appeal.  Liddell  then  appealed  to  the  Privy  Council,  which  was 
now  for  the  first  time  called  in  to  consider  ritualistic  matters. 
In  this  he  committed  a  fatal  mistake,  but  at  the  time  it  was 
considered  that  these  were  purely  legal  questions.  Nevertheless 
it  established  a  precedent  that  acted  badly  in  the  ensuing  cases. 
The  Privy  Council  pronounced  the  Ornaments  Rubric  as  authori- 
tative, and  therefore  allowed  cross,  credence,  altar-lights,  the  cross 
on  the  screen,  and  confirmed  the  courts  below  in  other  respects. 
This  was  in  1857.  Now,  although  Mr.  Liddell  gained  on  almost 
every  point,  he  gained  it  by  recognizing  the  authority  of  a 
secular  court  in  things  sacred. 

Next  ensued  the  case  Flamank  v.  Simpson,  1866-8,  and 
this  was  taken  along  with  Martin  v.  Mackonochie  in  the  Court 
of  Arches.  Sir  Robert  Phillimore  decided  that  lights  on  the 
altar  were  legal ;  that  incense,  the  mixed  chalice,  and  the  eleva- 
tion of  paten  and  chalice  after  consecration,  were  not. 

The  Privy  Council  in  1870  suspended  Mackonochie  for  three 
1  months  for  disobeying  its  judgment,  thus  assuming  a  power  to 
inflict  a  spiritual  penalty,  which  pertained  alone  to  the  Bishop. 
I  Mr.  Mackonochie  submitted  to  this  usurpation,  and  desisted 
from  the  ministrations  of  S.  Alban's,  whereas,  had  he  been 
better  advised,  he  would  have  ignored  the  sentence, 

The  next  important  case  was  Elphinstone  (afterwards  Hebbert) 
v.  Pnrchas,  1869-71.  The  Dean  of  Arches  decided  that  the 
Eucharistic  vestments,  the  Eastward  position,  wafer-bread,  and 
the  mixed  chalice  were  legal.  Then  ensued  an  appeal  to  the 
Privy  Council,  which  reversed  the  judgment,  as  well  as  its 
own  decision  in  the  case  of  Beale  v.  Liddell.  Mr.  Purchas  put 
in  no  appearance,  and  left  the  case  undefended,  owing  to 


240 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


his  poverty ;  nevertheless  the  taxed  costs  amounted  to 
£7,661  18s.  yd.,  which  he  was  quite  unable  to  pay. 

In  the  first  ritual  suit,  the  Knightsbridge  case,  it  may  be 
said  that  no  suspicion  was  entertained  that  the  appeal  to  the 
Court  of  Privy  Council  was  a  recognition  of  secular  interference 
in  ecclesiastical  matters,  that  ought  to  be  resisted.  The  spiritual 
flaw  was  present  then,  as  it  was  later,  but  it  had  escaped  detec- 
tion. When,  however,  the  Privy  Council  advanced  its  claims 
to  determine  what  doctrines  might  be  depraved  by  a  priest 
without  rendering  him  incapable  of  holding  a  benefice  in  the 
Church,  the  eyes  of  Churchmen  were  opened,  and  a  determined 
resistance  was  organised.  In  all,  some  nineteen  to  twenty 
prosecutions  took  place,  and  the  most  conflicting  judgments 
were  given. 

The  two  Primates  and  most  of  the  Bishops  put  their  heads 
together  to  contrive  how  to  pitchfork  the  Catholic  clergy  if  not 
out  of  the  Church,  at  least  into  gaol,  and  ultimately  deprive 
them  of  their  cures.  They  hoped  by  means  of  a  well-framed 
Bill  to  obtain  means  to  make  a  clean  sweep  of  these  Churchmen 
out  of  the  Establishment.  Lord  Shaftesbury  took  the  Bill  out 
of  the  hands  of  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  made  it  more 
stringent,  and  divested  it  of  nearly  all  the  safeguards  the  Bishops 
had  provided.  The  Act  was  passed  in  1874.  Disraeli  was  at 
the  time  looking  out  for  a  good  Tory  war-cry,  and  found  it  in 
"Down  with  the  Ritualists!''  and  amid  a  storm  of  cheers,  in 
introducing  the  Bill  into  the  House  of  Commons,  described  it 
as  a  Bill  to  put  down  Ritualism  and  u  mass  in  masquerade." 

It  happened  that  when  Tait  had  prepared  his  Bill,  Parlia- 
ment was  dissolved,  and  this  necessitated  a  new  Convocation — 
which,  however,  did  not  meet  until  the  Bill  was  already  before 
the  House.  When  Convocation  did  meet,  the  Lower  House 
refused  approval  of  the  proposals  of  the  Archbishop  and  Bishops. 

Tait  had  attempted  in  his  draft  of  a  Bill  to  place  the  decision 
in  the  hands  of  the  Bishops  and  a  Board  of  Assessors.  But  this 
was  not  to  Lord  Shaftesbury's  mind,  and  he  proposed  amend- 
ments that  totally  altered  the  character  of  the  Bill,  ignoring  the 
Diocesan  Courts  and  creating  anew  Court  of  Final  Instance,  but 
with  appeal  allowed  to  the  Privy  Council.  The  Archbishops  and 
Bishops  weakly  gave  way — only  stipulating  that  a  bishop  might 
veto  a  prosecution  when  it  appeared  to  be  captious  and  un- 
reasonable. To  this  Lord  Shaftesbury  and  Lord  Cairns  grudg- 
ingly consented. 


STURM  UND  DRANG 


241 


Accordingly  the  bishop,  on  the  representation  of  an  arch- 
deacon, a  churchwarden,  or  any  three  aggrieved  parishioners, 
might  transmit  the  case  to  be  heard  by  the  judge,  or  else  veto 
it.  As  an  additional  insult  to  the  clergy  the  Archbishops  of 
Canterbury  and  York  appointed  Lord  Penzance,  an  ex- judge 
of  the  Divorce  Court,  to  act  in  this  new  court.  He  at  once  and 
peremptorily  refused  to  qualify  himself  as  an  ecclesiastical  judge 
by  taking  the  customary  oaths,  and  insisted  that  his  jurisdic- 
tion derived  not  from  the  Church,  but  solely  from  Parliament. 

The  first  suit  under  the  Public  Worship  Regulation  Act  was 
that  of  Clifton  v.  Ridsdale.  Lord  Penzance  pronounced  judg- 
ment according  to  the  ruling  of  the  Privy  Council  in  Hebbert  v. 
Purchas;  and  Mr.  Ridsdale  misguidedly  appealed  against  it  to 
the  Privy  Council.    The  appeal  was  dismissed  on  every  point. 

The  Church  Association  now  considered  that  it  had  got  a 
tool  in  its  hand,  unsavoury  though  it  might  be,  which  would 
do  its  work  thoroughly.  Down  to  1882  eighteen  suits  were 
initiated  under  the  Act,  and  eight  were  vetoed  by  the  Bishops. 

Five  clergy  were  sent  to  prison  for  contempt  of  Court, 
because  they  refused  to  recognize  the  Court  of  Lord  Penzance  : 
A.  Tooth,  Vicar  of  S.  James's,  Hatcham,  in  1877  ;  T.  P.  Dale, 
Rector  of  S.  Vedast  and  S.  Michael  le  Quern,  in  the  City  of 
London,  1880  ;  S.  F.  Green,  Rector  of  S.  John's,  Miles  Platting, 
188 1-2  ;  R.  W.  Enraght,  Vicar  of  Holy  Trinity,  Bordesley, 
1880,  and  J.  Bell-Cox,  perpetual  curate  of  S.  Margaret's,  Toxteth 
Park,  Liverpool,  in  1887. 

I  have  room  for  giving  an  account  of  but  few  of  these,  and 
I  will  begin  with  the  first  of  all,  that  of  Mr.  Tooth,  who  led 
the  way — the  true  way,  that  should  have  been  followed  in 
previous  cases. 

The  first  case  under  the  Public  Worship  Regulation  Act  of 
1874  was  that  of  Hudson  v.  Tooth,  and  was  directed  against  the 
Rev.  Arthur  Tooth,  Vicar  of  St.  James's,  Hatcham,  a  hamlet  of 
the  ancient  parish  of  Deptford.  The  church  and  its  services 
were  very  little  known.  It  had  been  Mr.  Tooth's  settled  policy 
to  work  his  parish  quietly  and  not  to  attract  attention.  The 
ceremonial  was  what  was  called  "  advanced  "  in  those  days, 
and  the  charges  were  of  the  usual  kind.  That  such  a  church 
should  have  been  attacked  was  a  little  surprising,  but  the  theory 
held  by  those  who  were  familiar  with  the  story  was  that 
the  proceedings  were  somewhat  "  accidental  "  in  their  origin. 
Some  zealous  young  men  had  inserted  a  glowing  account  in  one 
16 


242 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


of  the  local  papers  of  the  services  on  S.  James's  Day  in  1874. 
This  advertisement  attracted  the  attention  of  a  newspaper 
reporter,  who  sent  particulars  to  the  Times.  There  were  some 
inaccuracies,  and  one  of  the  officers  of  the  church  wrote  a  letter 
of  corrections.  Mr.  Tooth  was  moved  to  write  to  the  Times, 
stating  in  very  clear  terms  what  he  understood  to  be  the  prin- 
ciples involved  in  the  attack  on  the  Church  made  by  the  Public 
Worship  Regulation  Bill,  then  under  consideration  in  Parlia- 
ment. This  caused  him  to  become  a  marked  man,  and  it  is 
generally  supposed  that  this  circumstance  led  to  his  selection 
as  the  first  victim  under  that  Act.  Proceedings  were  begun 
after  the  Rules  and  Orders  of  the  new  Court  had  been  settled  in 
the  following  year.  Mr.  Tooth  saw  quite  clearly,  what  many 
others  did  not  see,  that  the  time  had  come  for  a  policy  of 
resistance.  In  that  policy  he  received  great  support,  although 
there  were  many  who  felt  that  it  could  not  be  justified.1  When 
it  was  known  that  proceedings  were  imminent,  before  the 
Bishop  of  Rochester  (T.  L.  Claughton)  had  taken  the  final  step, 
Mr.  Tooth  sent  a  letter  to  his  lordship  making  an  offer  that  if  he 
(the  Bishop)  would  try  the  case  by  his  own  authority,  in  accord- 
ance with  the  clear  law  of  the  Church,  independently  of  the 
decisions  of  the  Judicial  Committee  of  the  Privy  Council,  and  the 
Bishop  found  him  guilty,  he  would  not  take  advantage  of  his  posi- 
tion as  incumbent,  but  would  submit.  This  offer,  in  the  opinion 
of  all  sensible  and  right-thinking  men,  acquitted  Mr.  Tooth 
of  any  suggestion  of  lawlessness  or  self-will.  When  the  first 
sentence  of  the  Court  was  delivered,  the  Bishop  of  the  Diocese, 
acting  as  bishops  did,  as  mere  apparitors  or  instruments  of 
secular  courts,  sent  a  clergyman  named  G.  to  take  charge  of 
the  parish.  He  was  met  at  the  door  by  the  Vicar  and  two 
churchwardens.  The  Vicar  made  a  clear  statement  as  to  the 
principles  upon  which  he  acted,  and  forbade  the  intruding 
priest  to  officiate  in  the  parish.  Then  from  the  pulpit  he  read 
a  statement  in  which  he  set  forth  the  reasons  why  he  was  pre- 
cluded from  taking  any  notice  of  Lord  Penzance's  Court  or 
his  Monitions,  and  the  services  proceeded  in  the  ordinary  way. 
The  services  went  on  as  usual  through  Advent  and  the  Christmas 
season.  There  was  much  controversy  in  the  newspapers,  and 
on  a  Sunday  morning  early  in  the  New  Year,  rioting  began. 
It  is  doubtful  if  the  riots  were  premeditated.    The  church 

1  The  Guardian  and  The  Church  Quarterly  urged  submission  under 
protest. 


STURM  UND  DRANG 


243 


was  very  crowded,  and  people  were  allowed  to  stand  about 
in  the  aisles.  When  the  Vicar,  who  was  celebrating  the  Holy 
Communion,  sang  the  opening  words  of  the  Creed,  a  man  at  the 
bottom  of  the  church  called  out  "  Liar  !  "  and  immediately  there 
ensued  a  commotion,  but  it  was  quelled  by  the  organist  striking 
up  a  popular  Christmas  hymn.  The  services  that  day  pro- 
ceeded in  peace.  But  this  had  opened  the  floodgates,  and  every 
available  Protestant  and  Orangeman  who  could  be  collected 
from  every  part  of  London  was  at  Hatcham  on  the  succeeding 
Sundays.  It  was  found  necessary  to  erect  a  barricade  around 
the  church.  Mr.  Tooth  refused  to  bow  to  the  mob,  and  on  one 
of  the  Sundays  barrels  of  beer  were  drunk  in  the  road,  women 
were  insulted,  and  ribald  songs  were  sung.  An  attempt  was 
made  to  force  an  entrance  into  the  church  by  means  of  an  im- 
provised battering-ram.  Mr.  Tooth  was  celebrating,  and  at  the 
height  of  this  attack  he  was  in  the  act  of  communicating.  After 
he  had  replaced  the  chalice  on  the  altar,  he  genuflected,  and 
turned  to  Mr.  H.  W.  Hill,  who  was  serving  and  kneeling  im- 
mediately behind  him,  and  quietly  asked,  "  Have  they  got  in  ?  " 
It  was  impossible  to  leave  the  church  that  day  until  nearly 
three  o'clock.  After  some  time  the  parish  was  more  or  less  in 
a  state  of  siege.  There  was  a  certain  amount  of  Protestant 
opposition  in  the  parish  itself,  which  was  partly  a  residential 
middle-class  place  with  a  considerable  working-class  popula- 
tion, but  the  riotous  element  was  imported  from  outside.  An 
application  to  notify  Mr.  Tooth  for  contempt  of  the  Court  of 
Lord  Penzance  was  speedily  made.  Mr.  Tooth  did  not  appear, 
and  in  due  time  a  writ  to  take  him  prisoner  was  issued  from  the 
Petty  Bag  Office  of  the  Court  of  Chancery.  There  was  said 
to  be  a  doubt  as  to  whether  the  vicarage  was  in  the  county  of 
Kent  or  the  county  of  Surrey,  for  it  stood  near  the  border. 
It  was  thought  that  this  difficulty,  which  need  not  have  arisen, 
was  an  expedient  on  the  part  of  the  authorities  so  that  they 
might  issue  the  writ  to  the  wrong  sheriff,  and  Mr.  Tooth  might 
go  into  the  other  county  and  keep  out  of  the  way.  If  there  is 
any  truth  in  this,  it  can  only  be  observed  that  the  authorities 
did  not  know  the  man.  Mr.  Tooth  went  to  some  business 
premises  belonging  to  the  late  Mr.  Thomas  Layman,  in  the 
Borough,  where  he  was  arrested  and  conveyed  to  Horsemonger 
Lane  Gaol.  He  was  imprisoned  on  January  22,  1877.  An 
account  of  these  proceedings  was  sent  to  the  Times. 

The  arrangement  of  prisons  in  those  days  varied.  Horse- 


244 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


monger  Lane  Gaol,  the  Surrey  prison,  was  an  old  establishment. 
Mr.  Tooth  was  confined  in  the  portion  reserved  for  people  under 
remand,  etc.  ;  the  place  of  exercise  was  a  small  yard  with  iron 
bars  around  it  and  over  it.  The  cartoon  in  Vanity  Fair  is  an 
exact  reproduction.  One  could  speak  to  a  prisoner  through 
those  bars,  or  a  gate  would  be  unlocked  and  one  could  be  locked 
in  with  him,  and  walk  about  in  the  enclosure,  or  retire  to  a 
cold,  horrid  room,  where  the  accommodation  was  most  wretched. 

Bishop  Claughton  now  revoked  the  licence  of  the  curate,  the 
Rev.  W.  H.  Browne,  afterwards  so  distinguished  in  the  Arch- 
bishops' Mission  to  Syria,  and  licensed  a  man  to  take  charge  of 
the  parish  in  the  room  of  vicar  and  curate  ;  but  as  it  was  found 
that  he  was  a  person  of  doubtful  antecedents,  he  had  to  be 
speedily  disposed  of. 

Canon  Liddon  visited  Mr.  Tooth  in  gaol,  and  wrote  in  his 
diary  :  "  Mr.  Tooth's  sick  face  in  that  cage  in  the  court  of  that 
gaol  quite  haunts  me."  For,  in  fact,  prisoners  were  usually  to 
be  seen  by  visitors  through  bars  like  wild  beasts. 

The  agitation  against  the  imprisonment  grew  in  such  volume 
that  the  authorities  began  to  be  concerned.  A  great  meeting 
was  held  at  the  Cannon  Street  Hotel,  in  the  City  of  London,  on 
Friday  night,  February  16,  1877.  It  was  a  meeting  for  men 
only,  and  there  were  more  people  in  the  street  than  could  get 
into  the  large  hall  of  the  hotel.  The  prosecutors  wrote  to  the 
Times  about  that  date,  saying  that  if  Mr.  Tooth's  friends  wanted 
him  to  be  got  out  of  prison  they  should  persuade  him  to  purge 
his  contempt.  That,  of  course,  was  a  foolish  suggestion.  Mr. 
Tooth's  friends  would  never  have  dreamt  of  following  such 
advice.  On  the  Saturday  morning  following  the  meeting  in 
the  City,  February  17,  1877,  the  astounding  announcement  was 
made  that  Lord  Penzance  had  held  a  Court  that  morning,  and 
ordered  Mr.  Tooth's  release — the  reason  given  being  that,  as  a 
clergyman  named  Dale  was  in  charge  of  the  parish,  and  the 
services  were  performed  in  a  proper  manner,  there  was  no 
reason  why  Mr.  Tooth  should  remain  in  prison.  Everybody 
was  astonished,  not  the  least  Mr.  Tooth,  when  at  about  six 
o'clock  in  the  evening  orders  were  received  by  Mr.  Keene,  the 
governor  of  the  gaol,  to  set  him  at  liberty.  There  is  no  doubt 
that  the  authorities  were  seriously  alarmed,  and  that  this  sudden 
step  was  taken  at  the  request  of  the  Government. 

The  need  for  rest  and  change  had  come,  and  accordingly  Mr. 
Tooth  went  abroad  for  a  few  months,  his  friends  holding  the 


STURM  ZJND  DRANG 


245 


fort  as  well  as  they  could.  In  May  (1877)  Mr.  Tooth  suddenly 
returned,  and  announced  his  intention  of  celebrating  the  Holy 
Communion  in  the  church  on  the  following  Sunday  morning. 
This  happened,  and  a  most  distressing  account  of  the  proceed- 
ings is  to  be  read  in  the  newspapers  of  the  day.  It  was  found 
necessary  to  break  into  the  church,  the  service  was  held,  and 
there  were  a  large  number  of  communicants.  This  was  a  fresh 
defiance  of  Lord  Penzance  and  all  his  works,  but  no  further 
action  was  taken  against  Mr.  Tooth.  But  other  things  were 
done.  One  afternoon  a  fearful  crash  was  heard  in  the  church  ; 
without  any  authority  from  any  Court,  some  of  the  Protestants 
of  the  parish  had  thrown  ropes  over  the  Rood  and  pulled  it 
to  the  ground.  In  the  end  serious  flaws  were  found  in  the 
proceedings  against  Mr.  Tooth,  and  they  were  quashed  by  the 
Court  of  Queen's  Bench.  When  Lord  Penzance's  Counsel  saw 
what  was  going  to  happen,  they  were  anxious  that  Mr.  Tooth 
should  give  an  undertaking  that  he  would  not  take  action  for 
false  imprisonment  against  that  worthy.  Mr.  Tooth  declined  to 
have  anything  to  do  with  Lord  Penzance.  Mr.  Tooth  was  per- 
suaded to  resign  his  benefice  for  the  sake  of  peace,  but,  as 
so  frequently  happens,  peace  did  not  come.  There  was  a  fresh 
series  of  riots  under  the  new  conditions,  and  it  was  some  years 
before  the  parish  settled  down.  On  the  resignation  of  Mr. 
Tooth's  successor,  the  advowson  was  sold. 

It  was  one  of  the  hypocrisies  of  the  Middle  Ages  that  the 
Church  protested  that  she  would  shed  no  blood,  commit  none 
to  the  flames.  Accordingly,  when  her  Court  of  Inquisition  had 
pronounced  a  man  a  heretic,  she  passed  him  over  to  the  tender 
mercies  of  the  State,  and  wiped  her  hands  of  the  consequences. 
It  was  not  the  Church  that  wielded  the  sword  and  applied  the 
torch,  but  the  secular  power.  Our  Bishops  were  not  guiltless 
of  this  evasion.  They  handed  over  such  men  as  the  rabble 
howled  at  and  the  press  denounced,  to  secular  judges,  to  try 
whether  they  were  heretics  or  not,  and  then  imprison  them. 
But  the  moral  responsibility  lay  with  them  for  all  that,  as  it 
was  they  who  delivered  up  their  clergy,  acting  the  part  of 
catchpoles.  The  first  of  the  shabby  procession  of  these  prelates 
— their  leader  in  the  line — was  Claughton  of  Rochester.  His 
example,  as  we  shall  see,  was  followed  by  the  Bishops  of  Lon- 
don, Manchester,  Liverpool,  Worcester. 

The  church  of  Miles  Platting  had  been  built  in  1855  by  Sir 
Benjamin  Heywood  in  a  district  with  4,000  inhabitants,  mostly 


246  THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 

poor.  The  patronage  was  in  his  hands,  and  after  his  death  in 
those  of  his  son,  Sir  Percival  Hey  wood.  Miles  Platting  is  a 
district  in  Manchester  peopled  entirely  by  mill-hands,  and  some 
very  poor.  It  is  an  unsightly  spot,  where  grows  no  blade  of 
grass ;  the  only  beautiful  thing  in  it  is  the  church,  grouped  with 
schools  and  clergy-house.  Bishop  Fraser,  in  his  charge  of  1876 
had  expressed  his  concurrence  with  the  Public  Worship  Regula- 
tion Act.  "  Though  I  have  never  regretted  that  statute,  I  feel 
that  if  it  were  rigorously  interpreted  or  severely  applied,  a 
train  would  be  laid  to  which  any  foolish  or  ill-disposed  person 
might  place  a  match  ;  and  if  an  explosion  occurred,  it  is  dim 
cult  to  say  what  mischief  might  not  be  done."  Yet  he  it  was 
who  applied  the  match.  In  1878  he  received  a  petition  pur 
porting  to  be  signed  by  320  parishioners  complaining  of  the 
proceedings  of  the  Rev.  S.  F.  Green,  the  Rector  of  Miles  Platting 
and  praying  "  that  your  worship  will  use  your  great  power  to 
irradicate  (sic)  this  abominable  idolatry."  The  petition  was 
forwarded  by  one  George  McDonagh — evidently  an  Irish  Orange- 
man— and  was  obviously  the  work  of  illiterate  people.  It  was 
scrawled  over  coarse  sheets  of  paper,  and  whole  groups  of 
signatures  were  in  one  handwriting,  and  whole  families,  without 
respect  to  age,  had  signed.  As  no  specific  charges  had  been 
made,  the  Bishop  could  not  act.  Dr.  Fraser  was  clearly  very 
reluctant  to  take  proceedings,  but  he,  like  the  other  bishops, 
had  sold  themselves  to  do  evil  under  the  Public  Worship  Regula- 
tion Act,  and  could  not  well  help  himself.  In  January  1879 
the  Church  Association  succeeded  in  securing  three  aggrieved 
parishioners — persons  who  never  attended  the  church,  two  of 
them  unknown  by  sight  to  the  Rector  and  the  congregation 
Not  a  single  communicant  (and  there  were  240  on  the  roll),  nor 
any  member  of  the  congregation,  had  anything  to  do  with  the 
presentment. 

In  April  some  Orange  Protestants  broke  into  the  church  at 
night,  and  a  cross,  a  number  of  vestments,  books,  and  other 
property  were  partially  destroyed  by  fire.  The  Bishop  had  the 
good  feeling  to  denounce  the  outrage. 

Mr.  Green  had  been  appointed  in  1869,  and  the  charges  brought 
against  him  were  :  (1)  the  mixed  chalice  ;  (2)  lighted  candles 
(3)  Eucharistic  vestments  ;  (4)  elevation  of  paten  and  chalice 

(5)  placing  the  alms  on  the  credence  table  after  presentation 

(6)  kneeling  at  the  consecration;  (7)  making  the  sign  of  th 
Cross  in  benediction;    (8)  using  the  Eastward  position  fo 


STURM  UND  DRANG 


247 


consecration  ;  (9)  raising  the  cup  ;  (10)  having  a  brass  cross 
on  a  ledge  above  the  altar  ;  (n)  and  a  Baldachino  over  the 
Holy  Table. 

The  charges  were  not  all  true.  Several  of  the  practices  had 
never  been  adopted  at  Miles  Platting.  But  because  others 
employed  them,  the  Church  Association  lawyers  assumed  that 
Mr.  Green  did  so,  and  the  witnesses  gave  evidence  in  reply  to 
leading  questions,  as  was  desired. 

The  Baldachino  was  actually  an  architectural  ornament  in 
marble  and  alabaster,  and  had  no  connection  with  the  services 
at  all,  and  had  been  erected  with  the  full  approval  of  the  Bishop 
some  years  previously. 

The  Rubric  orders  that  "  the  ornaments  of  the  church,  and  of 
the  ministers  thereof,  at  all  times  of  their  ministration  shall  be 
retained,  and  be  in  use,  as  were  in  this  Church  of  England,  by 
the  authority  of  Parliament,  in  the  second  year  of  the  reign  of 
King  Edward  the  Sixth."  There  exists  no  manner  of  doubt 
as  to  what  these  ornaments  were,  but  the  Privy  Council  had 
decided  that  "  shall  be  retained  "  meant  "  shall  not  be  retained," 
much  as  it  might  judge  that  "  Thou  shalt  love  thy  neighbour 
as  thyself  "  should  mean  "  Thou  shalt  not  love  thy  neighbour 
as  thyself."1 

Mr.  Green  refused  to  accept  the  ruling  of  the  Privy  Council, 
and  the  case  was  carried  before  Lord  Penzance's  Court.  Mr. 
Green  declined  to  attend,  and  in  1879,  for  disobedience  and 
contempt  of  Court,  was  condemned  and  was  imprisoned  in 
Lancaster  Castle  on  March  19,  1881,  condemned  also  to  pay 
the  bill  of  costs,  which  amounted  to  £450  ;  and  because  he 
could  not  do  this,  the  sale  of  his  "  goods  and  chattels  "  took 
place  at  the  rectory  on  August  4  and  5  of  the  same  year,  and 
his  wife  and  children  were  turned  out  of  the  house  into  the 
street.  Indeed,  regarding  the  whole  transaction  as  iniquitous, 
Mr.  Green  would  not  have  paid  the  sum  had  he  been  able. 

The  position  taken  up  by  Mr.  Green  when  summoned  before 
the  Bishop  had  been  that  he  knew  nothing  of  the  three  com- 
plainants, and  that  it  was  an  insult  to  the  congregation  to 
whom  he  ministered  that  such  persons  should  presume  to  inter- 

1  Judge  Coleridge  said  of  the  Rubric  :  "  The  clause  in  question,  by  which 
I  mean  the  Rubric  in  question,  is  perfectly  unambiguous  in  language, 
free  from  all  difficulty  as  to  construction."  Sir  R.  Phillimore  said  :  "  After 
repeated  and  attentive  perusal  of  the  language,  it  (the  Rubric)  does  quite 
appear  to  me  as  plain  as  any  which  is  to  be  found  in  any  statutory 
enactments." 


248 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


fere  with  the  services.  When  the  Bishop  ascertained  what  their 
real  character  was,  he  would  have  put  the  charges  in  the  waste- 
paper  basket,  had  he  not  given  his  word  to  his  secretary  to  put 
the  Act  in  motion.  It  was  also  believed  that  his  action  was 
due  to  the  malign  influence  of  Archbishop  Thomson.  After 
Mr.  Green's  discharge  from  prison,  he  and  Bishop  Fraser  never 
met  again. 

In  prison  Mr.  Green  suffered  somewhat  from  loss  of  exercise, 
and  he  was,  at  his  own  request,  set  to  wheel  in  the  coals  for 
two  divisions  of  the  gaol. 

Sir  Percival  Heywood  appealed  to  the  Home  Secretary,  after 
Mr.  Green  had  been  incarcerated  a  twelvemonth,  for  the  release 
of  the  Rector.  The  only  answer  he  got  was,  "  Yield,  and  he  shall 
be  released  ;  refuse  to  yield,  and  he  shall  remain  where  he  is." 

Archbishop  Thomson  and  Archbishop  Tait  became  alarmed 
at  the  feeling  that  was  being  roused  among  Churchmen  at  the 
prolonged  imprisonment  of  Mr.  Green,  and  they  made  various 
suggestions  to  Bishop  Fraser  as  to  how  the  difficulty  might  be 
got  over,  and  Mr.  Green  be  released.  But  the  Bishop  of  Man- 
chester did  not  see  his  way  to  falling  in  with  their  suggestions. 
He,  however,  sent  Archdeacon  Norris  to  Lancaster  Gaol  to  de- 
mand of  Mr.  Green  that  he  should  submit  to  canonical  obedience 
to  his  ordinary.  Mr.  Green  replied :  "  To  prevent  all  possi- 
bility of  misconception,  I  beg  leave  to  add,  that  by  '  canonical 
obedience '  I  understand  obedience  to  the  rules  and  laws  of 
the  Church,  and  that  it  is  a  part  of  the  office  of  a  bishop  to  see 
that  such  rules  are  observed.  That  my  obligation  to  obey  the 
rules  of  the  Church  is,  like  the  obligation  to  obey  the  moral 
law,  entirely  independent  of  whether  the  bishop  thinks  it  his 
duty  to  require  obedience  to  them  or  no.  That,  should  the 
bishop  order  what  is  inconsistent  with  a  rule  of  the  Church  in 
the  name  of  some  other  Power,  we  must  obey  the  Church  and 
take  the  consequences.  As  there  is  a  rule  of  the  Church  (the 
Ornaments  Rubric)  which  orders  lights,  vestments,  incense,  and 
the  mixed  chalice,  there  is  no  possibility  of  canonical  obedience 
except  in  conformity  to  that  rule." 

The  Lower  House  of  the  Northern  Convocation  moved  in  the 
matter,  but  the  Archbishops  and  Bishops  declined  to  do  more 
than  appeal  to  the  Church  Association  to  be  a  little  lenient. 
They  appealed  to  deaf  ears.  Let  it  be  clearly  understood  that 
Dr.  Fraser,  Bishop  of  Manchester,  by  refusing  to  interpose  his 
veto,  had  brought  matters  to  this  condition.    And  now  three 


STURM  UND  DRANG 


249 


years  had  elapsed  since  the  Rector  of  Miles  Platting  had  been 
inhibited  by  Lord  Penzance.  On  September  27,  1882,  Bishop 
Fraser  wrote  to  the  patron  informing  him  that,  under  the 
Public  Worship  Regulation  Act,  Mr.  Green  was  deprived,  and 
that  the  benefice  of  S.  John's,  Miles  Platting,  had  become  void. 
Thereupon,  from  prison,  Mr.  Green  wrote  to  Sir  Percival  Hey- 
wood  to  say  that  he  would  himself  voluntarily  resign  the  living. 
This  he  did  for  three  reasons.  (1)  He  learned  that  the  Bishop 
of  Manchester  was  about  to  apply  to  Lord  Penzance  to  order 
his  release  on  the  grounds  of  his  deprivation,  and  he  hoped  by 
resignation  to  spare  the  Church  the  humiliation  of  seeing  the 
Bishop  stooping  to  the  ex-divorce  judge  to  obtain  a  favour.  (2) 
The  Bishop  was  taking  steps  to  sequestrate  the  revenue  of  the 
benefice.  This  Sir  Percival  would  oppose,  and  consequently 
the  baronet  would  be  involved  in  a  costly  lawsuit.  (3)  He  felt 
that  he  could  not  maintain  himself  in  his  position  at  S.  John's 
in  defiance  of  his  diocesan,  and  with  the  police  empowered  to 
eject  him  from  the  church  and  thus  create  a  scandal. 

On  the  eve  of  All  Saints'  Day  two  announcements  were  made 
from  the  pulpit  of  S.  John's,  one  of  the  Rector's  resignation,  the 
other  to  the  effect  that  the  Bishop  was  sending  a  clergyman 
to  take  charge  of  S.  John's  and  reduce  the  ritual  to  the  cathedral 
standard.  Then  the  congregation  adjourned  to  the  school- 
room, where  Mr.  Green's  letter  bidding  farewell  to  his  flock  was 
read  to  them.  "  Was  there  any  one  who  remained  untouched 
by  its  pathetic  tone  ?  "  asks  the  Monthly  Record.  "  Strong  men 
were  drying  their  eyes  and  stifling  their  sobs,  women  in  un- 
disguised grief  wailed  aloud ;  and  no  one  who  beheld  the  scene 
could  do  otherwise  than  confess  how  close  and  firm  and  real  a 
thing  was  the  spiritual  relationship  which  bound  this  flock  to 
their  pastor."  The  living  being  vacant,  on  November  4  the 
Bishop  of  Manchester  appeared,  represented  by  his  Chancellor, 
in  the  court  of  Lord  Penzance  to  sue  for  the  release  of  Mr. 
Green,  on  the  ground  of  his  being  no  longer  rector  of  Miles  Plat- 
ting, and  therefore  no  longer  able  to  disobey  Lord  Penzance's 
inhibition.  This  was  granted,  and  Mr.  Green  was  discharged 
after  a  confinement  of  nearly  twenty  months. 

Sir  Percival  now  nominated  the  Rev.  H.  Cowgill,  the  curate 
who  had  taken  charge  of  the  parish  during  Mr.  Green's  absence, 
but  Dr.  Fraser  refused  him  institution.  The  patron  brought 
a  charge  against  the  Bishop  for  his  refusal,  but  lost  it,  and  was 
condemned  to  pay  not  only  his  own  costs,  but  those  of  the 


250 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Bishop  as  well,  amounting  to  £650,  exclusive  of  the  cost  of  his 
own  counsel.  It  was  a  scandalous  abuse  of  justice,  as  there  was 
absolutely  nothing  that  could  be  brought  against  the  character 
and  teaching  of  Mr.  Cowgill. 

Dr.  Fraser  now,  on  the  ground  that  the  living  was  vacant, 
and  that  the  patron  had  not  nominated,  himself  appointed  a 
rector,  the  Rev.  T.  Taylor  Evans,  who  would  put  an  end  to 
the  services  as  conducted  hitherto  at  S.  John's.  Whereupon  the 
congregation,  sidesmen,  the  organist  and  choir  resigned,  and 
the  congregation  was  dispersed  to  find  homes  in  the  churches 
in  the  neighbourhood. 

Bishop  Fraser  died  in  1886,  and  in  May  1890  the  new  Bishop 
of  Manchester,  Dr.  Moorhouse,  presented  Mr.  Evans  to  another 
living,  and  Sir  Percival  Heywood  was  again  free  to  exercise  his 
rights  as  patron.  The  living  was  offered  to  and  accepted  by 
the  Rev.  Arthur  Anderton,  who  was  received  enthusiastically ; 
the  services  were  restored  to  their  former  beauty  and  devotion ; 
the  ornaments  of  the  altar  were  replaced,  the  vestments  were 
again  worn,  and  the  ritual  observed  was  practically  the  same  as 
it  had  been  before  the  attack  on  Mr.  Green.  At  the  same  time 
the  Sisters,  who  had  left  the  parish  when  placed  under  Mr. 
Evans,  returned  and  took  up  their  work  again  at  Miles  Platting. 

The  tyranny  was  overpast.  Dr.  Fraser,  who  had  been  en- 
couraged to  act  by  Archbishop  Thomson,  as  was  believed,  and 
the  Church  Association  had  gained  nothing.  The  persecution 
had  served  only  to  deepen  in  the  hearts  of  the  congregation 
their  love  of  the  Church  and  her  sacred  services. 

"  Once  again  the  patron,  the  rector  and  the  people  were  in 
happy  accord.  The  work  was  taken  up  on  the  old  lines,  the 
Guilds  were  revived,  and  many  of  the  teachers  returned  to  the 
Sunday  School.  The  church  became  once  more  the  pride  and 
joy  of  the  parishioners,  who,  as  of  old,  brought  gifts  which,  as 
they  were  all  very  poor,  were  the  fruits  of  self-sacrifice ;  but 
which  were  willingly  given  to  make  their  house  of  God  and  its 
services  more  beautiful."  1 

In  this  case,  as  in  many  another,  the  promise  was  observed, 
"  No  weapon  formed  against  thee  shall  prosper." 

S.  Margaret's  Church,  Princes  Road,  Liverpool,  owed  its 
origin  to  the  late  Robert  Horsfall,  a  munificent  benefactor  to 
the  Church  in  Liverpool.    Its  first  incumbent  was  the  Rev. 

1  Thomas  Percival  Heywood.  Printed  for  private  circulation  (Man- 
chester, 1899),  p.  188. 


STURM  UND  DRANG 


251 


Charles  Parnell  (1869-1876).  From  the  first  he  was  exposed  to 
annoyance  and  opposition  fomented  by  the  so-called  Evan- 
gelical clergy,  who  did  not  relish  that  their  monopoly  in  Liver- 
pool should  be  invaded,  and  that  definite  Church  teaching  and 
ritual  should  be  given  in  the  place  of  feeble  sentimentalism. 
From  the  first  there  was  daily  Celebration,  as  well  as  daily 
prayer  in  S.  Margaret's,  and  an  earnest,  devoted  congregation 
gathered  within  its  walls. 

Immediately  opposite  S.  Margaret's  is  the  Greek  Church, 
and  this  was  consecrated  by  the  Archbishop  of  Syra  and  Tenos 
on  Sunday,  July  16,  1870.  The  Archimandrite  in  charge  and 
the  wardens  had  invited  the  clergy  of  S.  Margaret's  to  be  pre- 
sent ;  and  as  the  Archbishop  had  expressed  a  wish  to  see  the 
interior  of  the  church,  he  was  invited  to  attend  one  of  the  ser- 
vices. This  he  did  on  a  Sunday  following,  at  Evensong,  when, 
at  the  conclusion  of  the  service,  he  gave  his  benediction  to  the 
congregation. 

This  afforded  occasion  to  the  local  branch  of  the  Church 
Association  to  interfere.  They  appealed  to  the  Bishop  of 
Chester  against  the  clergy  of  S.  Margaret's  for  allowing  the 
Oriental  prelate  to  take  any  part  in  the  service.  Much  cor- 
respondence ensued,  but  finally  the  Bishop  (Jacobson)  had  the 
good  sense  to  put  a  stop  to  it. 

In  1880  the  Rev.  J.  C.  Ryle  was  appointed  first  Bishop  of 
Liverpool,  on  the  nomination  of  Lord  Beaconsneld,  a  strong 
Evangelical  partisan  and  a  platform  orator.  Mr.  Charles 
Parnell  was  attacked,  a  suit  being  instituted  against  him  under 
the  Church  Discipline  Act  by  a  certain  Mr.  W.  Roughton, 
supported  by  some  members  of  the  Church  Association.  Legal 
proceedings  went  on  for  two  years,  and  then  Mr.  Parnell 
resigned,  hoping  that  with  his  resignation  the  suit  would  break 
down,  as  being  brought  against  himself  personally.  To  him 
succeeded  the  Rev.  J .  Bell-Cox.  He  refused  to  appear  before  the 
Court  either  in  person  or  by  representation,  as  he  could  not 
and  would  not  recognize  the  jurisdiction  of  Lord  Penzance  in 
matters  ecclesiastical. 

On  this  occasion  Dean  Church  of  S.  Paul's  wrote  to  the  Arch- 
bishop :  "  This  Bell-Cox  case  has  come  home  to  my  sense  of 
justice  far  more  strongly  than  any  of  the  previous  imprison- 
ments. They  were  in  the  thick  of  battle,  and  of  hot  blood. 
This  comes  after  all  has  cooled  down.  .  .  .  To  me  it  comes  with 
the  sense  of  almost  intolerable  wrong,  when  one  sees  a  quiet 


252 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


man,  in  full  agreement  with  his  congregation,  made  a  victim, 
in  the  midst  of  all  the  varieties  of  opinion  and  practice.  .  .  . 
Think  how  the  arguments  for  Rome  would  be  pressed,  and  how 
bitterness  of  mind  gives  them  force.  The  one  counterpoise  to 
this  would  be  if  men  could  remember  that,  though  the  lawyers 
had  been  hard  upon  them,  the  Episcopate  had  made  its  voice 
heard  clearly  and  powerfully  on  the  side  of  patience  and  forbear- 
ance and  real  fairness,  against  the  miserable  system  of  ignoble 
worrying  which  ends  in  things  like  this  Bell-Cox  scandal." 

Lord  Penzance  issued  a  judgment  on  June  13, 1886,  suspending 
the  Rev.  James  Bell-Cox  "  ab  officio  "for  a  period  of  six  months, 
that  is,  "from  preaching  the  Word  of  God,  administering  the 
Sacraments,  and  performing  all  other  duties  and  offices  in  the 
said  church  or  chapel  of  S.  Margaret's,  Toxteth  Park,  aforesaid, 
and  elsewhere  within  the  Province  of  York."  The  Vicar  of 
S.  Margaret's  disregarded  the  judgment,  and  continued  to  preach 
and  minister  the  Sacraments  as  before  throughout  the  six  months 
of  suspension. 

Thereupon  a  writ  was  issued  and  served  on  May  4,  1867, 
for  the  apprehension  of  Mr.  Bell-Cox,  and  his  consignment  to 
prison.  He  was  accordingly  removed  to  Walton  Gaol  and 
there  lodged  in  an  ordinary  felon's  cell,  to  undergo  solitary 
confinement.  "  Over  each  cell  door  there  is  a  receptacle  for 
holding  a  card,  stating  the  term  of  the  occupier's  imprisonment. 
It  was  not  until  after  my  return  from  the  morning  service 
in  the  chapel,  on  Sunday,  May  8th,  that  I  found  mine  had  been 
recorded  and  placed  in  situ.  It  consisted  simply  of  one  word, 
and  differed  entirely  from  that  of  every  other  prisoner.  The 
word  was  '  Indefinite.'  " 

No  sooner  had  the  lock  been  turned  in  the  prison  door  than 
efforts  were  made  to  obtain  Mr.  Cox's  release,  and  it  was  urged 
in  the  Queen's  Bench,  before  Lord  Chief  Justice  Coleridge  and 
others,  that  the  judgment  of  Lord  Penzance  had  not  been 
pronounced  by  him  in  person,  but  committed  to  a  delegate, 
which  he  was  not  qualified  to  do.  There  were  other  technical 
errors  committed  in  the  judgment,  and  the  Court  on  this  plea 
ordered  that  Mr.  Bell-Cox  should  be  released  from  prison  on 
May  20. 

At  once  the  prosecutor,  Mr.  James  Hakes,  appealed  against 
the  order  and  obtained  its  reversal.  Whereupon  the  friends  of 
Mr.  Cox  appealed  to  the  House  of  Lords.  Then  Mr.  Hakes, 
fearing  that  the  House  of  Lords  would  give  a  judgment  in  favour 


STURM  UND  DRANG 


253 


of  Mr.  Bell-Cox's  liberation,  offered  to  desist  from  further  action 
against  the  Vicar,  if  he  would  give  "  his  written  undertaking 
that  thenceforth  the  services  of  S.  Margaret's  Church  should 
be  conducted  in  strict  accordance  with  the  monition  of  June 
1886."  Mr.  Cox  promptly  refused  this.  The  appeal  was  heard, 
and  his  release  was  confirmed. 

It  must  be  clearly  understood  that  what  was  now  before 
the  Judicial  Committee  was  nothing  ecclesiastical.  It  was  a 
question  whether  Lord  Penzance  had  not  committed  a  technical 
error  by  pronouncing  sentence  through  a  proxy. 

The  bill  of  costs  Mr.  Bell-Cox  was  charged  with  paying 
amounted  to  £225  15s.  6d.,  but  when  taxed  was  reduced  to 
£144  os.  10^.    Among  the  items  were  these  payments  to  spies  : 

1884.    July   5-8.   Sending  two  clerks  to  Liverpool  to  take 

evidence  as  arranged  ;   charge  for  their  time,  two  working  £    s.  d. 
days     .       .       .       .       .       .       .       .        .  .660 

Paid  them  for  railway  fare  and  expenses  and  time  on  Sundays  .    711  o 
July  8.    Drawing  statement  of  evidence        .        .        .  .0110 

July  19-22.    Sending  two  clerks  to  Liverpool,  to  take  evidence 

as  arranged  ;  charge  for  time  of  two  working  days  .  .660 
Paid  for  railway  fare  and  expenses  and  time  on  Sundays  .790 

"  Will  you  walk  into  my  chambers  ?  "   said  the  Spider  to  the  Spy, 
"  They're  really  nicely  furnished,  and  not  so  very  high  ; 
You've  only  got  to  put  your  head  inside  my  green-baize  door, 
You'll  see  so  many  curious  things  you  never  saw  before." 

"  I'm  always  up  to  business,"  said  the  Lawyer  to  the  Spy  ; 
"  The  Company  engaged  me  to  catch  whate'er  goes  by. 
They  go  in,  but  have  to  pay,  I've  heard  of  it  before." 
Said  the  Lawyer,  "  The  Company  discharges  all  the  score. 

"  Just  take  this  little  pencil  and  this  memorandum  book, 

Go  to  S.  Martyr-in-the-Lane,  and  take  a  casual  look. 

Don't  kneel  or  pray,  or  sing,"  said  the  Lawyer  to  the  Spy, 

"  But  note  and  mark — you  understand — I'll  digest  them  by  and  by. 

Will  you  ?  will  you  ?  won't  you  ?  "  said  the  Lawyer  to  the  Spy, 

"  'Tis  really  a  superior  thing  to  go  to  Church  to  pry  !  " 

The  wickedness  of  the  whole  proceeding  does  not  appear  to 
have  struck  the  Bishop  or  the  prosecutors.  But  to  them  might 
well  be  addressed  the  words  of  S.  Peter  after  the  healing  of  the 
lame  man  at  the  Beautiful  Gate  of  the  Temple  :  "  And  now, 
brethren,  I  wot  that  through  ignorance  ye  did  it,  as  did  also 
your  rulers."    It  is  their  sole  excuse. 

Whether  it  was  a  concerted  plan  among  the  Bishops,  or 


254 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


whether  it  was  due  to  a  policy  initiated  by  Bishop  Baring  of 
Durham,  I  cannot  say,  but  soon  appeared  the  carrying  out  of 
a  scheme,  cowardly  and  mean  to  the  last  degree,  of  refusing 
licences  to  curates  nominated  by  High  Churchmen,  so  as  to 
paralyze  their  efficiency  and  work  for  the  saving  of  souls. 

Upon  Bishop  Baring's  appointment  to  Durham  in  1861,  on 
the  death  of  Bishop  Villiers,  the  Archdeacon  at  a  public  meeting 
thanked  God  that  the  diocese  was  presided  over  by  a  man  who 
was  "  using  every  opportunity  to  stamp  out  Ritualism." 

Dr.  Dykes  was  appointed  Vicar  of  S.  Oswald's,  Durham,  in 
1862,  by  the  Dean  and  Chapter.  The  parish  had  at  first  a 
population  of  four  thousand,  but  this  number  was  increased  by 
the  addition  of  a  pit-village  near  by.  The  Ecclesiastical  Com- 
missioners, seeing  the  urgency  of  the  case,  undertook  to  pay 
the  stipends  of  two  curates,  as  well  as  to  pay  the  house-rent  of 
one.  But  now  the  Bishop  of  Durham  stepped  in,  writing  from 
Auckland  Castle  on  July  4,  1873:  "  I  must  require  of  an  in- 
cumbent, on  his  nomination  of  a  curate,  that  he  give  me  his 
written  pledge,  that  he  will  not  require  of  such  curate — 

"  I.  That  he  wear  coloured  stoles. 

"  2.  That  he  take  part,  or  be  present  at  the  burning  of  Incense. 

"3.  That  he  turn  his  back  to  the  Congregation  during  the 
celebration  of  the  Holy  Communion,  except  when  '  ordering  the 
Bread.' 

"  I  must  also  require  of  a  curate  a  written  promise  that  he 
will  offend  in  none  of  these  things.1  C.  Dunelm." 

Dr.  Dykes  was  urged  from  all  sides  not  to  give  way.  The 
things  requested  might  be  trifles,  but  a  principle  was  involved 
that  must  be  maintained.  He  took  opinion  of  counsel,  and  the 
opinion  was  : 

1.  That  the  Bishop  had  no  right  to  exact  such  conditions. 

2.  That  the  proper  course  to  be  pursued  was  for  Dr.  Dykes 
and  the  curate  proposed  to  apply  to  the  Court  of  Queen's 
Bench  for  a  rule,  calling  upon  the  Bishop  to  show  cause  why  a 
writ  of  mandamus  should  not  issue  against  him,  compelling  the 
Bishop  to  license  the  curate. 

This  was  signed  by  John  Duke  Coleridge,  A.  J.  Stephens,  and 
Chas.  Bowen. 

The  Court,  however,  hardly  condescended  to  hear  the  case, 
and  it  was  dismissed. 

1  Incense  never  had  been  used  at  S.  Oswald's,  nor  did  Dr.  Dykes  pur- 
pose its  introduction. 


STURM  UND  DRANG 


255 


Since  then,  to  the  present  day,  this  has  been  the  policy  of 
the  Bishops,  spiritually  to  starve  a  parish,  when  the  services 
are  such  as  do  not  meet  with  their  approval,  in  the  hopes  of 
forcing  a  High-Church  incumbent  to  give  way,  either  on 
account  of  the  failure  of  his  health  or  out  of  despair  at  being 
able  singlehanded  to  minister  to  his  flock.  In  the  case  of  Dr. 
Dykes,  it  killed  him.    He  died  in  1876. 

The  method  adopted  by  the  Bishops  is  a  recurrence  to  one 
of  the  most  reprehensible  acts  of  the  Popes,  who,  if  they  could 
not  get  their  own  way  with  bishops  or  kings,  placed  the  see  or 
the  kingdom  under  interdict,  denying  the  people  the  benefit  of 
the  Sacraments,  as  an  act  of  revenge  against  their  superiors. 
None  probably  would  more  severely  condemn  a  Pope  for  pro- 
nouncing an  interdict  than  those  very  bishops  who  trip  so 
lightly  in  his  footsteps. 

Charles  John  Ellicott  was  a  Palmerstonian-Shaftesbury  bishop 
(1863-1897).  He  had  as  text  attributed  to  him  :  "  Woe  be 
to  the  shepherds  of  Israel  that  do  feed  themselves  :  should 
not  the  shepherds  feed  the  flocks  ?  Ye  eat  the  fat  and  ye 
clothe  you  with  the  wool,  ye  kill  them  that  are  fed  :  but  ye  feed 
not  the  flock."  This  applied  to  him  on  account  of  his  treatment 
of  the  priest  and  people  of  S.  Raphael's,  Bristol. 

The  Sailors'  College,  Bristol,  with  its  church  or  chapel  com- 
monly known  as  S.  Raphael's,  was  erected  by  Canon  Miles 
and  opened  in  1859,  tne  church  not  being  consecrated.  The 
College  consisted  of  six  almshouses  for  aged  seamen,  and  the 
church  was  seated  for  350  persons.  A  chaplain  was  charged 
with  the  government  of  the  College,  and  with  the  conduct  of 
the  services  in  the  church.  For  nineteen  years  there  had  not 
been  a  single  Sunday  without  a  Celebration  of  the  Holy  Com- 
munion. For  the  greater  part  of  the  time  there  had  been  two 
Celebrations  every  Sunday,  and  one  daily.  In  the  year  1877 
there  were  4,691  Communions.  An  average  of  90  communicants 
per  week  existed  in  the  church.  With  its  bright  services  and 
ever-open  doors  the  church  was  a  home  to  the  poor  of  the 
district.  Of  the  communicants  two-thirds  at  least  belonged  to 
the  poorest  class. 

On  December  8,  1877,  the  church  was  in  as  high  a  state  of 
efficiency  as  it  had  ever  attained.  There  was  not  a  murmur  of 
discontent,  but  founder,  priests  and  people  were  in  perfect 
harmony,  preparing  for  and  looking  forward  to  the  great 
Christmas  festival.    Then,  without  a  word  of  warning  or  remon- 


256 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


st ranee  of  any  kind,  the  Bishop  of  Gloucester  and  Bristol  sent 
a  curt  and  imperious  letter  commanding  that  all  the  points 
condemned  in  the  Ridsdale  judgment  of  the  Privy  Council, 
together  with  others,  should  be  given  up.  The  Chaplain,  Mr. 
Ward,  agreed  to  abandon  many  of  the  usages  to  which  the 
Bishop  took  exception,  but  not  lights,  vestments  and  the  mixed 
chalice.  He  felt  that  he  could  not  submit  to  Privy  Council 
decisions,  and  to  the  Bishop  acting  as  official  of  that  Court. 

Whereupon  Bishop  Ellicott  peremptorily  withdrew  Mr. 
Ward's  licence  and  ordered  the  closing  of  the  church  and  the 
dispersal  of  the  congregation. 

For  fifteen  years,  to  1892,  in  the  midst  of  a  teeming  population, 
S.  Raphael's  remained  closed,  till  in  1893  it  was  consecrated  by 
the  Bishop,  forced  at  last  to  yield.  And  what  forced  him  to 
yield  was  his  own  conscience.  Probably  only  those  behind 
the  scenes  knew  how  complete  and  how  generous  was  his  sur- 
render. He  himself  did  not  hesitate  to  ascribe  the  change  in 
his  attitude  to  the  grace  of  God  ;  for  when  he  was  asked  why 
he  had  so  completely  altered  his  point  of  view,  he  said  :  "  Ah  ! 
God  the  Holy  Ghost  works  great  changes."  He  consecrated 
the  church  and  of  his  own  free  will  assigned  a  parish  to  it,  and 
with  a  distinct  understanding  that  the  services  and  ceremonial 
should  go  on  exactly  as  before  the  church  was  closed.  He  ever 
after  took  every  opportunity  to  show  kindness  to  Mr.  Ward, 
and  to  the  community. 

In  1888  the  Church  Association  struck  at  higher  game  than 
poor  parish  priests.  It  petitioned  the  Metropolitan  to  cite 
Bishop  King  of  Lincoln  for  alleged  transgressions  against  judg- 
ments of  the  Privy  Council,  in  the  Minster  and  in  S.  Peter- at- 
Gowts  in  December  1887 — viz.  the  use  of  the  Eastward  position, 
altar- lights,  the  mixed  chalice,  Agnus  Dei,  the  sign  of  the  cross 
at  the  absolution  and  blessing,  and  the  ablution  of  the  sacred 
vessels  at  the  altar.  On  January  4,  1889,  the  Archbishop  cited 
the  Bishop  of  Lincoln  to  appear  before  his  Court,  which  had 
been  in  abeyance  for  two  hundred  years.  In  February,  the 
Bishop  appeared  before  Dr.  Benson,  the  Archbishop,  and  pro- 
tested that  in  the  case  of  a  bishop,  the  rest  of  the  bishops  of 
the  province  should  have  been  summoned  to  try  him.  The 
Archbishop  overruled  the  objection,  and  the  trial  began  on 
February  5,  1890.  The  judgment — if  judgment  it  can  be  called, 
for  the  Archbishop  pronounced  that  it  was  an  "  opinion  only  " — 
was  generally  in  favour  of  the  Bishop.    Thereupon  the  prose- 


STURM  UND  DRANG 


257 


cution  appealed  to  the  Privy  Council ;  but  that  Council  had 
suffered  such  humiliation,  and  had  been  so  utterly  discredited 
in  matters  ritualistic  and  ecclesiastical,  that  it  did  not  want 
to  be  again  involved  in  such  suits,  and  it  dismissed  the  appeal, 
August  2,  1892,  only  attempting  to  save  its  face  by  the 
absurd  contention  that  the  vicar  of  the  parish  of  S.  Peter-at- 
Gowts  was  responsible  for  the  lights,  and  not  the  Bishop.. 

"  Though  some  doubt  was  expressed  as  to  the  jurisdiction 
of  the  Archbishop's  Court,  its  spiritual  character  and  moral 
authority  were  unquestionable.  Without  violation  of  conscience 
or  principle  the  clergy  could  yield  to  it  an  obedience  which  they 
were  obliged  to  deny  to  Lord  Penzance  and  the  Privy  Council, 
and  even  to  the  Bishops,  when  instead  of  relying  on  their  spiritual 
authority  they  aspired  only  to  enforce  the  decrees  of  these 
tribunals." 1 

At  the  first  blush  it  would  seem  that  the  clergy  who  had 
rebelled  against  the  decision  of  the  highest  Court  of  the  realm, 
and  in  many  instances  against  the  wishes  of  their  diocesans, 
desired  to  be  a  law  unto  themselves.  But  it  was  not  the  case. 
I  have  added  in  the  Appendix  to  this  chapter  the  substance 
of  a  paper  that  circulated  at  the  time,  and  which  places  their 
position  on  an  impregnable  basis. 

A  vast  amount  of  money  was  spent  by  the  Church  Associa- 
tion in  these  ritual  suits,  and  it  gained  but  Pyrrhic  victories. 
On  the  most  barefaced  quibbles  the  Courts  condemned  Catholic 
ceremonial.  For  instance,  every  one  knows  that  the  Act  of 
Uniformity  (1662)  was  passed  to  constrain  the  Puritan  Con- 
formers,  and  compel  them  to  observe  the  minimum  of 
rubrical  observance.  The  Privy  Council  turned  it  into  a 
weapon  against  those  who  observed  a  ritual  higher  than  the 
minimum. 

To  the  credit  of  the  Evangelicals  it  must  be  said  that  a  large 
number  of  their  clergy  objected  to  the  proceedings  of  the 
Church  Association,  and  that  the  capital  of  £50,000  with  which 
it  started,  and  which  was  supposed  to  suffice  to  put  down 
Ritualism,  was  subscribed  by  fanatical  and  wealthy  laymen, 
not  a  few— Dissenters.  At  the  end,  the  Association  found  itself 
impoverished,  powerless,  and  an  object  of  contempt.  It  had 
been  kept  alive  only  by  donations  from  a  few  wealthy  Protes- 
tants, and  all  along  had  refused  to  publish  a  list  of  subscribers, 
fearing,  maybe,  that  it  would  reveal  the  slight  support  it  re- 
1  Dictionary  of  English  Church  History  (1912),  p.  519. 

17 


258 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


ceives  from  the  bulk  of  Churchmen,  even  from  men  of  the  same 
Evangelical  party. 

The  case  of  Mr.  Mackonochie  was  one  of  peculiar  sadness. 
He  was  Vicar  of  S.  Alban's,  a  beautiful  church  that  had  been 
erected  in  a  horrible  slum  off  Holborn,  which  he  and  his  curates 
worked  ;  and  they  gathered  about  them  a  large  and  devoted 
congregation.  The  great  spiritual  results  effected  in  this 
hitherto  neglected  district  attracted  outside  attention.  Mr. 
Mackonochie  was  singled  out  for  attack,  and  Dr.  Tait,  then 
Bishop  of  London,  readily  acceded  to  his  prosecution,  and  the 
case  proceeded  against  him  in  various  forms  and  before  different 
Courts. 

I  can  but  give  a  summary  of  his  persecutions.  In  1870  he 
was  charged  with  disobedience  to  the  mandate  of  the  Privy 
Council,  and  was  suspended  for  three  months.  He  at  once  sub- 
mitted. Hitherto  his  course  had  been  marked  by  submission. 
Because  the  lights  had  been  forbidden,  he  had  put  them  out ; 
because  elevation  was  forbidden,  he  had  ceased  to  elevate ; 
because  genuflexion  was  forbidden,  he  had  ceased  to  genuflect, 
and  had  contented  himself  with  bowing;  because  the  cere- 
monial mixing  of  water  with  the  wine  had  been  forbidden,  he 
had  abandoned  that  usage ;  and  now,  when  the  secular  Court, 
assuming  to  itself  spiritual  jurisdiction,  suspended  him  from 
preaching  and  celebrating  the  Sacraments  for  three  months,  he 
submitted.    It  was  a  fatal  error. 

On  December  7,  1874,  Mr.  Mackonochie  was  condemned  by 
the  Dean  of  the  Court  of  Arches  to  six  weeks'  suspension.  This 
Court,  although  that  of  the  Archbishop,  yet  held  itself  bound  to 
accept  the  rulings  of  the  Judicial  Committee  of  the  Privy  Council, 
and  this  radically  vitiated  its  authority  as  a  spiritual  court. 
Nevertheless  Mr.  Mackonochie  deemed  it  wise  to  submit.  The 
senior  curate,  Mr.  Stanton,  refused  to  celebrate  the  Holy  Com- 
munion in  the  manner  ordered  by  the  Court  according  to  the 
rules  laid  down  by  the  Privy  Council,  and  the  whole  congrega- 
tion migrated  for  that  service  to  S.  Vedast's,  Foster  Lane.  The 
Church  Association  now  turned  on  the  Rev.  T.  Pelham  Dale, 
rector  of  that  church,  as  he  also  wore  Eucharistic  vestments  and 
used  altar  lights.  He  was  condemned  by  Lord  Penzance, 
before  whom  he  refused  to  appear,  and  in  October  1880  was 
committed  to  prison.  A  specially  disgraceful  feature  in  this 
case  was  that  the  Church  Association  laid  hands  on,  and 
used  for  the  prosecution,  the  charitable  trust  funds  left  for 


STURM  UND  DRANG 


259 


the  poor  of  S.  Vedast's  parish,  to  help  them  to  meet  their  law 
expenses. 

But  to  return  to  Mr.  Mackonochie.  In  a  letter  to  the  Bishop 
of  London  in  May  1875,  he  said  :  "I  have  been  now  more  than 
twenty-six  years  in  Sacred  Orders.  During  the  whole  of  that 
time  I  have  endeavoured,  to  the  best  of  my  power,  to  obey 
the  laws  of  that  Church,  and  minister  her  offices  for  the  glory 
of  God  and  for  the  edification  of  His  people.  How  I  may  have 
served  in  that  capacity  for  the  first  of  these  objects  it  will  be 
for  the  Great  Day  to  show  ;  as  to  the  latter,  it  would  be  a 
foolish  assumption  of  ignorance  not  to  own  that  God  has  blessed 
me.  What  has  been  the  result  ?  With  the  very  rarest  excep- 
tions, I  have  received  not  one  word  of  encouragement  from  my 
superiors  in  the  Church.  I  have  now  been  four  times  dragged 
before  Courts  ;  I  have  stood  in  court  side  by  side  as  a  fellow 
culprit  with  a  clerk  charged  with  adultery  ;  I  have  found  in 
the  Highest  Court  of  Appeal  every  door  for  his  escape  obsequi- 
ously held  open  by  his  judges,  and  the  one  door  of  justice  and 
equity  as  vigorously  barred  by  the  same  hands  against  me. 

"  I  do  not,  your  Grace,  complain,  but  venture  to  state  facts."  1 

In  1879  Lord  Penzance  inhibited  Mr.  Mackonochie  from  the 
exercise  of  his  spiritual  functions  ;  but  now  he  disregarded 
the  sentence.  The  Church  Association  and  Lord  Penzance  did 
not  have  the  courage  to  commit  him  to  prison. 

The  year  1874  was  one  of  great  trial  and  searchings  of  heart 
to  the  faithful  in  the  Church  of  England.  The  Public  Worship 
Regulation  Act  was  to  come  into  force  in  the  ensuing  year. 
All  those  clergy  who  had  been  striving  for  souls,  and  knew 
that  God  had  blessed  their  efforts,  knew  also  that  the  Bishops, 
hitched  on  to  the  World,  were  against  them.  I  was  walking 
in  his  garden  with  the  Archbishop  of  York  (Thomson) ,  when  he 
said  to  me  :  "  Can  you  explain  how  it  is  that  in  France,  which 
you  know  pretty  well,  there  exists  such  a  deadly  hostility  to 
the  Church,  whereas  here  in  England  there  is  no  such  ani- 
mosity ?  "  "  I  can  explain  it,"  I  replied.  "  In  France  every 
priest  is  at  a  grapple  with  the  Devil  righting  for  every  human 
soul.  Here— the  Church  plays  second  fiddle  to  the  World,  and 
is  looked  on  with  indifference  as  a  paid  musician  to  scrape  what 
tunes  it  calls  for." 

The  one-sided  Purchas  judgment  had  filled  Churchmen  with 
dismay,  condemning  as  it  did,  among  other  practices,  the  East- 
1  Quoted  in  Mr.  Russell's  S.  Alban  the  Martyr  (1913),  p.  142. 


260 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


ward  position.  A  protest  was  signed  by  4,700  clergy,  to  the 
Archbishops  and  Bishops,  but  they  regarded  it  not. 

A  feeling  came  over  Churchmen  that  the  Bishops  were  in 
league  fighting  against  God.  I  must  say  it,  for  we  felt  it,  we 
knew  it  was  so ;  and  many  doubted  whether  a  house  divided 
against  itself  could  stand — whether  an  army  of  which  the 
generals  were  virtually  in  the  pay  of  the  enemy  could  maintain 
its  ground  ? 

Mr.  Russell  writes  :  "  It  is  difficult  for  those  who  passed 
through  it  to  realize  the  stress  of  1874.  The  Ritualists  saw 
arrayed  against  them  a  powerful  and  unscrupulous  Prime 
Minister  (Disraeli) ;  the  two  Archbishops,  both  able  men  and 
bent  on  destroying  ritual ;  a  bench  of  pavid  bishops  ;  an  abso- 
lutely united  House  of  Commons,  a  House  of  Lords  bewildered 
and  divided ;  the  whole  weight  of  the  press,  society,  and,  as  far 
as  it  could  be  ascertained,  public  opinion.  No  wonder  that 
men's  hearts  were  failing  them  with  fear,  and  with  looking  after 
those  things  which  were  coming  on  the  Church." 

In  this  year,  in  consequence  of  the  apparently  hopeless  pros- 
pect, there  ensued  many  secessions  ;  earnest  young  men  preparing 
for  Holy  Orders,  and  longing  to  enter  them,  were  struck  back, 
and,  changing  their  intention,  went  into  business  or  entered 
Government  offices. 

Dr.  Liddon  wrote  :  "  There  is  no  reason  for  despondency. 
We  shall  live  to  see  the  drowned  Egyptians  on  the  shore  even 
yet!"  And  we  have.  I  have  written  with  some  bitterness, 
but  I  cannot  help  it ;  only  those  who  passed  through  the  ordeal 
of  that  time  can  tell  what  were  the  agonies  of  soul  that  were 
endured,  the  shame  and  disgust  that  was  felt  at  the  conduct 
of  the  Bishops,  and  the  certainty  that  there  was  no  justice,  no 
fair  hearing  to  be  accorded  to  Churchmen.  Policy  to  please 
the  ungodly  and  unbelieving  ruled  the  judgments  of  the  Courts, 
and  besotted  prejudice  steeped  the  minds  of  the  people.  The 
Bishops,  like  frightened  sheep,  huddled  together,  and  took 
counsel  how  they  might  save  their  own  fleeces. 

It  had  been  much  the  same  in  the  reign  of  William  Rufus, 
when  the  hireling  Bishops  sided  with  the  Red  King  to  drive 
Anselm  out  of  the  realm,  and  assisted  to  subvert  the  laws  of 
justice  and  equity.  Disraeli — a  Prime  Minister  like  the  parent 
in  the  sledge  in  a  Siberian  winter,  who  threw  his  children  to 
the  pursuing  wolves — cast  the  Churchmen  to  be  mangled  and 
torn,  if  only  he  could  save  his  Jewish  skin  and  the  tinsel  coronet 


STURM  ZJND  DRANG  261 

to  which  he  aspired.  It  was  a  time  of  stress — of  darkness ;  and 
it  required  a  strong  faith  to  look  up  to  Him  who  sitteth  above 
the  water-floods  and  remaineth  a  King  for  ever,  to  come — 
walking  upon  the  waters  to  enter  into  and  save  His  Church.  He 
did  it  in  spite  of  the  Taits,  the  Thomsons  and  the  Ryles. 

By  degrees,  the  English  mind,  slow  to  move,  came  to  realize 
that  there  had  been  gross,  partisan  miscarriage  of  justice  in  the 
judgments  of  the  Privy  Council.  Some  of  those  who  had  sat 
I  in  the  Court  admitted  it.  In  the  judgment  of  1868,  the  con- 
demnation of  Catholic  usages  was  only  carried  by  the  casting 
vote  of  Archbishop  Thomson.  The  imprisonments,  of  which 
there  were,  as  already  said,  five  in  all,  brought  the  Court  of 
Lord  Penzance  into  such  odium  that  the  Bishops  at  last  plucked 
up  courage  to  veto  prosecutions.  In  1877,  Bishop  Merriman 
of  Grahamstown  told  Archbishop  Tait  to  his  face,  at  the  Croydon 
Church  Conference,  that  "  the  Bishops  of  England  had  placed 
their  croziers  in  the  hands  of  an  ex-Divorce  Court  judge." 

After  the  imprisonment  of  Mr.  Bell-Cox,  there  were  no  more, 
and  for  several  years  before  Lord  Penzance's  retirement  in 
1899  ms  Court  had  been  practically  deserted.  The  discredited 
Act  remains  unrepealed,  and  the  Court  is  only  visited  at  in- 
tervals by  the  caretaker,  to  dust  the  unused  seats. 

In  1898  there  broke  out  a  fresh  burst  of  Puritan  fanaticism 
against  ritualistic  practices.  In  February  1899,  Archbishop 
Temple  announced  his  willingness,  along  with  Archbishop  Mac- 
lagan  of  York,  to  hear  cases  in  dispute,  and  pronounce  opinions 
on  them  without  any  reference  to  the  judgments  of  the  Privy 
Council,  and  to  be  guided  solely  by  evidence  brought  before 
him  and  his  brother  archbishop.  The  use  of  incense  and 
portable  lights  in  processions  were  the  first  points  considered, 
and  neither  he  nor  the  Archbishop  of  York  considered  that 
sufficient  proof  had  been  adduced  that  they  were  authorized 
by  the  Church  of  England.  No  judgment  was  pronounced, 
only  an  opinion  expressed. 

The  Privy  Council,  the  Court  of  Lord  Penzance,  mob  violence, 
the  mean  device  of  the  Bishops  to  refuse  licence  to  clergy  of 
the  advanced  party,  have  all  failed  to  put  down  ceremonial. 

It  would  have  been  well  indeed  if  the  Bishops  had  taken  to 
heart  the  counsel  of  Gamaliel :  "  Now  I  say  unto  you,  Refrain 
from  these  men  and  let  them  alone,  for  if  this  counsel  or  this 
work  be  of  men,  it  will  come  to  naught,  but  if  it  be  of  God  ye 
cannot  overthrow  it ;   lest  haply  ye  be  found  even  to  fight 


262 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


against  God."  The  Jewish  Council  had  more  sense  than  the 
bench  of  Bishops,  for  "  to  him  they  agreed."  The  Bishops  did 
not  consider  whether  the  work  or  counsel  was  of  God,  but  whether 
it  was  displeasing  to  the  public  with  whom  they  desired  to  stand 
well,  and  above  all,  to  wealthy  laymen  without  whose  aid  they 
feared  that  pet  diocesan  schemes  must  collapse. 

About  this  time  appeared  a  parody  on  "  Who  killed  Cock 
Robin  ?  "  by  Mr.  Chatterton  Dix,  of  which  I  give  several,  but 
not  all  the  verses: 

"Who  killed  Devotion  ?  " 

"I,"  said  the  Nation,  "  with  new  Regulation, 

I  killed  Devotion." 

' '  Who  saw  it  die  ?  ' ' 

The  Court  made  reply,  "  With  my  loving  eye 
I  saw  it  die." 

"  Who  caught  the  blood  ?  " 

"  I,"  said  the  Act,  "  by  Parliament  backed, 

I  caught  its  blood." 

"  Who'll  make  its  shroud  ?  " 

"  I,"  said  the  Devil,  with  look  very  evil, 

"I'll  make  its  shroud." 

"  Who'll  be  the  clerk  ?  " 

"We,"  said  the  Press,  "with  Amen  to  Success, 
We'll  be  the  clerk." 

"  Who'll  dig  its  grave  ?  " 

"I,"  said  the  Law,  "  'twas  once  my  cat's-paw, 
I'll  dig  the  grave." 

"  Who'll  be  chief  mourner  ?  " 

"  I,"  said  the  World,  with  scornful  lip  curl'd, 

"  I'll  be  chief  mourner." 

All  the  lawyers  in  Court  fell  a-sighing  and  a-sobbing 
When  Devotion  was  killed  and  an  end  came  to  Robbing  ! 


APPENDIX  TO  CHAPTER  X 


TO  make  intelligible  the  position  assumed  by  the  High 
Church  party  in  opposition  to  the  Public  Worship  Regula- 
tion Act  and  the  Court  of  Lord  Penzance,  I  give  here  the 
major  portion  of  a  paper  that  circulated  widely  among 
them  and  which  formulated  their  objections  : 

I.  Church  principles  imply  that — 

1 .  The  Church  of  Christ,  of  which  the  Anglican  Church  claims  to 
be  a  part,  is  an  organized  society  founded  by  her  Divine  Lord, 
independently  of  the  will  of  the  Civil  Power. 

2.  The  Church  was  founded  to  teach  mankind  the  Divine  Will 
in  regard  to  Faith,  Worship  and  Morals  ;  and  for  this  purpose  she 
received  authority  from  her  Lord  for  the  instruction,  guidance 
and  government  of  her  members. 

3.  The  words  "  All  power  is  given  unto  Me  in  heaven  and  in 
earth  :  go  ye  therefore  and  teach  all  nations  .  .  .  and  lo,  I  am 
with  you  ahvay,  etc.,"  show  that  the  authority  possessed  by  the 
Church  for  the  teaching,  discipline  and  edification  of  her  members 
is  derived  from  Christ,  and  in  things  spiritual  is  independent  of 
any  Civil  Power,  and  superior  to  it. 

4.  The  aforesaid  spiritual  authority  conferred  upon  the  Apostles 
was,  under  the  guidance  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  transmitted  by  them  to 
their  successors,  to  be  exercised  in  conformity  with  the  original 
commission  and  the  law  of  the  Church  Universal. 

5.  This  authority,  being  the  gift  of  Incarnate  God  to  His  Church, 
and  a  trust  committed  by  Him  to  the  Priesthood,  is  inalienable  ; 
and,  therefore,  comes  within  the  scope  of  the  Divine  Rule,  "  Render 
unto  Caesar  the  things  that  be  Caesar's,  and  unto  God  the  things 
that  be  God's." 

6.  A  National  Church  which  surrenders  the  authority  to  any 
Civil  Power  is  unfaithful  to  the  trust  committed  to  her  by  God. 

7.  Spiritual  Courts,  or  "  Courts  Christian,"  whether  Diocesan  or 
Provincial,  if  rightly  constituted,  are,  among  other  means,  the 
canonical  instruments  of  the  Church  for  the  regulation  and  exercise 
of  the  aforesaid  authority. 

II.  Catholic  principles  are  violated  by — 

1.  The  creation  of  a  Court  for  the  trial  of  Spiritual  Causes  by 
the  Civil  Power  alone. 

263 


264 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


2.  The  acquiescence  of  the  Church  in  the  suppression,  whether 
partial  or  total,  of  her  Courts  Christian,  by  the  Civil  Power. 

3.  Judgments  in  Spiritual  Causes  pronounced  by  the  Secular 
Court. 

4.  Sentences  in  Spiritual  Causes  inflicted  by  a  Secular  Judge. 

5.  The  appointment,  without  the  consent  of  each  several  bishop 
or  archbishop,  of  one  and  the  same  person  as  Judge  in  the  Spiritual 
Court  of  more  than  one  Diocese  or  Province. 

6.  The  appointment  by  the  Civil  Power  of  the  Judges  of  Spiritual 
Courts. 

7.  The  interference  of  the  Civil  Power  with  the  rights  of  bishops 
and  archbishops  to  exercise  a  free  and  independent  choice  in  the 
appointment  of  the  Judges  of  these  respective  Courts. 

III.  Constitutional  principles  are  asserted  in — 

1.  The  Ordinance  of  William  the  Conqueror,  a.d.  1185  :  "  I  com- 
mand and  enjoin  by  Royal  Authority  that  no  bishop  or  arch- 
deacon or  any  one  else  .  .  .  bring  a  cause  which  pertains  to  the  cure 
of  souls  to  the  judgment  of  secular  men." 

2.  The  8th  of  the  Constitutions  of  Clarendon,  a.d.  1164  :  "Of 
Appeals."  If  they  arise,  they  ought  to  proceed  from  the  archdeacon 
to  the  bishop,  from  the  bishop  to  the  archbishop  ;  and  lastly 
(if  the  archbishop  fail  in  doing  justice)  to  the  King,  that  by  his 
precept  the  controversy  be  ended  in  the  Archbishop's  Court,  so  that 
it  go  no  further  (i.e.  to  Rome)  without  the  King's  consent. 

3.  The  Magna  Charta,  a.d.  12 15  :  "First:  We  have  granted 
to  God,  and  by  this  our  present  Charter  have  confirmed,  for  us  and 
for  our  heirs  for  ever,  that  the  Church  of  England  shall  be  free, 
and  shall  have  her  whole  rights  and  liberties  inviolate." 

4.  The  Statute  of  Appeals,  a.d.  1537:  "The  Body  Spiritual 
.  .  .  usually  called  the  English  Church,  which  always  hath  been 
reputed  .  .  .  and  is  also  to  this  hour,  sufficient  and  meet  of  itself, 
without  the  intermeddling  of  any  exterior  person  or  persons,  to 
declare  and  determine  all  such  doubts  ...  as  to  their  rights 
spiritual  doth  pertain." 

5.  The  Declaration  prefixed  to  the  XXXIX  Articles,  a.d.  1628  : 
"  If  any  differences  arise  about  the  external  policy,  concerning 
the  Injunctions,  Canons,  and  other  Constitutions  whatsoever  thereto 
belonging,  the  clergy  in  their  Convocation  is  to  order  and  settle 
them," — recognized  and  acted  upon  in  the  Royal  Licence  and  Letters 
of  Business  to  Convocation  in  the  years  1661,  1689,  1710,  1713, 
and  1715. 

6.  The  Bill  of  Rights,  a.d.  1689:  "  The  Commission  for  erecting 
the  late  Court  of  Commissions  for  Ecclesiastical  Causes,  and  all  other 
Commissions  and  Courts  of  like  nature,  are  illegal  and  pernicious." 

7.  The  Coronation  Oath,  1837 :  "  Will  you  preserve  unto  the 
Bishops  and  Clergy  of  this  Realm,  and  to  the  Churches  committed 


APPENDIX  TO  CHAPTER  X 


265 


to  their  charge,  all  such  rights  and  privileges  as  by  law  do  or  shall 
appertain  unto  them,  or  any  of  them  ?  "    "  All  this  I  promise  to  do." 

IV.  Conclusion  :  The  "  Public  Worship  Regulation  Act"  of  1874 
contravenes  the  foregoing  principles  : 

1.  Because  the  new  Judge  was  created  by  the  sole  authority 
of  Parliament,  in  order  to  decide  spiritual  suits  and  to  inflict  spiritual 
censures. 

2.  Because  the  new  Judge  was  created  without  the  consent  and 
against  the  will  of  the  Church,  so  far  as  it  was  formally  expressed, 
apart  from  all  authority  from  Convocation,  and  in  defiance  of  a 
Resolution  of  the  Lower  House. 

3.  Because  the  constitutional  rights  of  Convocation  have  thus 
been  violated  and  denied  ;  and  the  clergy  have  been  deprived  of 
their  prescriptive  rights  by  the  House  of  Commons,  from  which  they 
alone,  as  an  Order,  are  excluded. 

4.  Because,  for  certain  causes,  the  Act  virtually  suppresses  the 
Diocesan  Courts,  and,  for  all  causes,  actually  suppresses  the  Pro- 
vincial Courts. 

5.  Because  by  the  operation  of  the  Act,  the  Spiritual  Jurisdiction 
of  the  Episcopate  is  in  some  cases  practically  suspended,  and  in 
others  absolutely  abolished. 

6.  Because,  by  the  office  of  the  new  Judge,  the  spiritual  rights 
of  the  priesthood  are  infringed,  both  by  the  Courts  of  first  instance, 
and  in  those  of  appeal. 

7.  Because  the  Act — 

(a)  Violates  the  law  of  Canonical  Discipline  even  to  a  greater 
extent  than  the  Bill  originally  introduced  by  the  Archbishop. 

(b)  Creates  a  new  Court  for  the  decision  of  questions  not 
only  ceremonial,  but  also  of  doctrine,  by  enacting  that  the 
new  Judge  shall  become  ex  officio  the  "  Official  Principal  of  the 
Arches  Court  of  Canterbury,"  and  that  "  all  proceedings  there- 
after taken  before  the  Judge  .  .  .  shall  be  deemed  to  be  taken 
in  the  Arches  Court  of  Canterbury  "  ;  and  further — 

(c)  Furnishes  unbelievers  with  a  weapon  of  offence  against 
Catholic  Truth  and  Worship. 

The  decision,  therefore,  of  the  new  Judge  cannot  in  conscience 
be  recognized  as  possessing  any  spiritual  character,  validity  or 
authority  by  English  Churchmen. 

Published  by  J.  Masters,  78,  New  Bond  Street,  London. 


CHAPTER  XI 


S.  SAVIOUR'S,  LEEDS 

I PURPOSE  narrating  the  story  of  a  pioneer  church  of  the 
Oxford  Movement  that  went  through  more  bitter  trials  and 
suffered  more  collapses  than  have  happened  to  any  other 
parish  church  in  England.  And  the  story  is  instructive,  for 
it  exhibits  the  difficulties  that  had  to  be  surmounted  by  those  who 
first  began  to  bring  to  bear  upon  the  people  the  full  teaching  of 
the  Church  and  to  break  up  the  ice  which  had  formed  over  the 
Established  Church  and  seemed  to  have  frozen  her  to  her  lowest 
depths.  The  story  will  also  show  what  were  the  hindrances 
earnest  Churchmen  met  with  from  those  who  should  have 
encouraged  the  work.1 

The  "  Bank  "  district  in  Leeds  was  so  called  from  its  lying  in 
close  proximity  to  the  N.E.  side  of  the  River  Aire,  and  occupying 
rising  ground  above  the  level  of  the  river.  The  sides  of  the 
river,  and  an  island  in  the  midst,  were  for  the  most  part  occupied 
by  factories.  The  chimney  of  the  "  Black  Dog  "  Mill  poured 
forth  its  volumes  of  smoke  at  the  very  level  of  the  floor  of  S. 
Saviour's  Church  when  built.  The  factories  furnished  employ- 
ment to  some  thousands  of  hands.  At  the  time  when  this  story 
begins  (1838-40),  the  population  amounted  to  about  12,000 
persons,  dwelling  on  an  area  of  about  40  acres.  About  twenty 
houses  only  sent  their  families  to  church  ;  a  few  of  the  other 
inhabitants  resorted  to  various  dissenting  meeting-houses  of  the 
locality.  There  were  somewhat  over  a  thousand  Irish  Roman 
Catholics,  well  looked  after  by  their  devoted  priests  ;  the  re- 
mainder, comprising  the  bulk  of  the  population,  lived  either  in 

1  I  owe  my  information  to  a  Narrative  of  Five  Years  at  S.  Saviour's, 
Leeds,  by  J.  H.  Pollen,  Fellow  of  Merton  College,  Oxford  (1 85 1)  ;  to  a 
History  of  the  Church  of  S.  Saviour's,  down  to  1872,  by  the  late  Rev.  G.  R. 
Grantham,  with  whom  I  was  well  acquainted  ;  also  to  my  own  acquaint- 
ance with  it  whilst  in  Yorkshire.  A  life  of  Mr.  Pollen  has  also  recently 
appeared  from  the  pen  of  his  daughter  (London,  191 2).  Much  also  may  be 
learned  from  Dean  Stephens's  Life  of  Dr.  Hook  (London,  1879),  and  from 
Canon  Liddon's  Life  of  Dr.  Pusey  (1893). 

266 


S.  SAVIOUR'S,  LEEDS 


267 


gross  profligacy,  combined  perhaps  with  attendance  at  Socialistic 
lectures,  or  else  in  apathy  and  utter  indifference  to  anything 
connected  with  the  Hereafter. 

Atheism  was  openly  taught  :  the  Rational  Pioneer  had  large 
audiences  of  an  evening,  consisting  chiefly  of  mill-hands.  Twenty- 
five  Reasons  for  being  an  Atheist  was  circulated  widely,  put  into 
the  hands  of  lads  and  lasses  coming  from  their  factories,  and 
thrust  in  at  cottage  doors. 

On  one  Sunday  morning,  whilst  the  parish  church  bells  were 
chiming,  a  poor,  wretched  man  brought  out  into  the  yard  near 
the  church  a  Bible  and  Prayer  Book,  and  publicly  burnt  them 
before  a  sympathizing  crowd. 

In  too  many  factories  the  owners  were  indifferent  as  to  the 
morals  of  their  workpeople,  regardless  of  other  responsibilities 
than  the  payment  of  wages  and  the  maintenance  of  order  and 
decency  during  the  working  day.  As  the  Rev.  J.  Slatter  wrote : 
"  The  part  immediately  around  S.  James's  Church  was  inhabited, 
with  a  few  exceptions,  by  the  most  wretched  characters  !  I 
had  given  me  by  the  police  a  list  of  the  brothels  in  my  district  ; 
and  I  was  horrified  to  find  that,  in  a  circle  of  one  hundred 
yards  of  which  my  room  was  the  centre,  there  were  no  less 
than  thirteen  of  such  dens.  The  proceedings  of  the  miserable 
creatures  who  tenanted  them  were  so  openly  disgusting  that  I 
was  obliged  to  call  in  the  aid  of  the  law  to  abate  the  nuisance. 
Children  of  from  ten  to  fifteen  years  old  were  not  only  familiar 
with,  but  practised,  sins  which  it  is  not  possible  even  to 
mention." 

In  some  back  lanes  were  rooms  used  for  balls,  where  the 
young  of  both  sexes  would  meet  after  each  day's  work  was  over  j 
and  up  to  late  hours  of  the  night  oaths  and  blasphemies  might 
be  heard  in  the  streets,  and  revolting  sights  be  witnessed  by 
the  passers-by.  Even  during  the  daytime,  no  decent  person 
could,  in  those  days,  pass  through  the  chief  street  of  the  district, 
East  Street,  when  the  mill  operatives  were  in  it,  without  being 
liable  to  personal  insult. 

Dr.  Hook,  Vicar  of  Leeds,  had  devised  a  plan  for  dividing 
Leeds  into  thirty  independent  parishes,  and  the  "  Bank  "  was 
to  be  the  site  of  one  of  them.  The  Rev.  J.  M.  Clarke  came 
as  Dr.  Hook's  curate,  and  took  up  his  quarters  in  East  Street. 
In  January  1838,  the  Rev.  George  Elmhirst  joined  him  to  work 
the  "  Bank,"  and  Mr.  Elmhirst,  a  sincere  Catholic,  began  by 
his  teaching  to  lay  the  foundations  of  the  future  work.  But 


268 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


his  labours  there  broke  him  down,  and  he  died  of  an  exhausted 
constitution  about  1844. 

Before  proceeding  any  further  with  the  subject  of  S.  Saviour's 
I  must  give  some  account  of  the  great  work  that  had  been 
done  by  Dr.  Hook  as  Vicar  of  Leeds.  He  had  been  Incumbent 
of  Holy  Trinity,  Coventry,  where  his  strong  personality  and  his 
stout  churchmanship  had  made  their  mark.  In  1837  ne  was 
appointed  Vicar  of  Leeds.  He  found  all  in  the  Church  in  a 
neglected  condition,  and  the  services  conducted  in  a  slovenly 
manner.  There  were  seven  Churchwardens,  and  none  of  thern 
except  the  one  appointed  by  the  Vicar  were  Churchmen.  When 
a  vestry  meeting  was  held  in  the  church,  they  put  their  hats 
and  coats  on  the  Holy  Table.  Hook  found  that  his  predecessor 
had  been  wont  to  communicate  the  people  in  their  pews,  and 
to  read  the  Ten  Commandments  and  the  earlier  portion  of  the 
Communion  Service  at  the  Reading  Desk.  Hook  was  a  forceful 
man  and  knew  his  own  mind,  and  Yorkshire  people  appreciate 
one  who  has  a  will  of  his  own. 

In  1838,  just  after  his  appointment  to  Leeds,  he  was  summoned 
to  preach  before  the  Queen  in  the  Chapel  Royal,  and  he  took 
for  his  text  "  Hear  the  Church  ;  "  the  object  of  the  sermon  was 
to  impress  upon  the  young  Queen  the  spiritual  nature  and 
claims  of  the  Church,  and  to  let  her  understand  that  the  Anglican 
Church  was  no  new  creation  of  the  Reformation,  but  the  old 
Church  based  on  Apostles  and  Prophets  and  Fathers,  that  had 
been  purified  of  abuses.  Lord  Melbourne  was  Prime  Minister, 
and  the  sermon  gave  great  offence  to  the  advisers  of  the  Queen. 

It  was  said  that  on  hearing  this  sermon  the  young  Queen 
was  so  much  affected  that  on  returning  home  she  retired  to 
her  chamber  for  about  an  hour,  to  think  over  what  had  been 
put  so  plainly  before  her.  The  sermon  was  published  and  ran 
through  twenty-eight  editions,  in  which  about  one  hundred 
thousand  copies  were  sold.  Letters  of  congratulation  poured  in 
from  all  directions.  Henry,  Bishop  of  Exeter,  said  that  he  had 
read  it  with  unmixed  gratification,  and  "  I  heartily  thank  you," 
he  wrote,  "  for  the  fidelity  as  well  as  the  ability  with  which  you 
have  placed  the  important  subject  before  the  mind  of  her  to 
whom  of  all  others  it  is  of  the  highest  consequence  that  the 
mighty  truth  should  be  familiar."  The  sermon  and  the  bold 
enunciation  of  the  true  position  of  the  Church  were  soon  effaced 
from  the  mind  of  the  Queen,  and,  especially  after  her  marriage 
with  Prince  Albert,  who  had  not  the  smallest  conception  of  the 


S.  SAVIOUR'S,  LEEDS  269 

Church  in  any  other  light  than  a  State  creation,  she  accepted 
the  Erastian  view  of  it.  In  1841  Dr.  Hook  had  completed  the 
new  parish  church  of  Leeds,  and  he  introduced  cathedral  services 
into  it,  perhaps  the  worst  style  of  music  that  could  have  been 
selected,  as  totally  uncongregational,  and  of  all  things  Yorkshire 

I people  love  to  hear  their  own  voices. 
Dr.  Hook  was  a  remarkably  plain  man,  broad-built,  with 
uncouth  features.  Dean  Peacock  of  Ely  was  wont  to  say  that 
"  he  himself  and  Hook  were — if  not  the  ugliest  men  in  England, 
then  certainly  they  were  such  in  the  ministry  of  the  Church."  A 
good  deal  was  made  of  Dr.  Hook  and  his  success.  He  was  be- 
praised  on  all  sides  except  by  the  Evangelicals,  and  this  served 
to  make  him  dictatorial,  and  to  suppose  that  all  his  methods  were 
perfect,  and  the  point  of  ritual  he  had  reached  must  not  be  trans- 
gressed. He  was  an  excellent  man,  but  he  loved  to  domineer, 
and  he  regarded  himself  very  much  as  if  he  were  the  Bishop  of 
Leeds. 

And  now  came  the  execution  of  his  notable  scheme  for  the 
subdivision  of  Leeds  into  ecclesiastical  districts. 

When  Dr.  Hook  was  meditating  the  building  of  many  churches, 
an  unknown  individual,  deeply  penitent  for  his  sins,  desired  to 
erect  a  house  of  God  as  a  thankoffering  for  having  been  brought 
to  a  consciousness  of  his  un worthiness.  This  was  Pusey  him- 
self, 1  and  he  suggested  that  the  money  might  well  be  spent  in 
Leeds.  Dr.  Hook,  to  whom  he  made  the  suggestion,  answered  : 
"  We  have  heard  of  your  sayings,  let  us  hear  something  of  your 
doings." 

Accordingly  it  was  decided  to  erect  a  church  on  the  "  Bank," 
and  connected  with  it  was  to  be  a  clergy-house  where  the  curates 
and  vicar  might  live  together  in  community,  and  form  a  college ; 
it  was  also  decided  that  the  patronage  should  be  vested  in  the 
college,  and  a  successor  elected  from  among  the  remaining 
clergy  on  the  death  of  a  vicar.  This  plan,  however,  was  never 
carried  out,  owing  to  the  opposition  of  the  Bishop,  at  that 
time  Dr.  Longley.  The  first  stone  was  laid  by  Dr.  Hook,  on 
Holy  Cross  Day,  1842.  Very  soon  afterwards  it  was  found  that 
this  stone  lay  over  the  shaft  of  a  disused  mine,  and  £1,000  had 
to  be  spent  in  making  the  foundation  secure. 

At  the  end  of  three  years  the  church  was  ready  for  conse- 
cration, but  then  two  or  three  difficulties  cropped  up.  The 

1  This,  though  it  was  known  to  but  two  or  three  until  his  death,  was 
not  till  then  revealed. 


270 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Bishop  objected  to  the  name — the  Holy  Cross — under  which 
the  church  was  to  have  been  dedicated.  Although  there  are 
two  festival  days  of  the  Holy  Cross  marked  in  the  Anglican 
Calendar,  and,  in  consideration  of  the  proposed  title,  the  church 
had  been  built  in  the  shape  of  a  cross,  Dr.  Longley  would  not 
be  induced  to  allow  it  to  be  thus  designated,  and  in  deference 
to  his  prejudice  the  title  was  changed  to  S.  Saviour. 

Next  he  objected  to  the  college  for  resident  curates  and 
vicar — it  savoured  too  much  of  a  monastic  institution,  although 
every  college  in  the  two  universities  is  so  ordered — and  that 
there  was  no  provision  made  for  a  wife,  and — hinted,  though  not 
expressed — no  nurseries.  He  was  ready  to  license  three  curates 
to  the  vicar,  but  no  more.  Accordingly,  to  humour  him,  the 
building  was  reduced  considerably  in  size. 

Moreover  he  objected  to  the  patronage,  which  accordingly 
was  retained  in  Dr.  Pusey's  hands  till  1870,  when  he  associated 
with  himself  Drs.  Liddon,  Bright,  and  Talbot.  Later  the 
advowson  was  given  to  the  Council  of  Keble  College. 

His  further  objection  was  to  the  legend  over  the  west  door 
inside,  on  a  scroll  of  zinc  :  "Ye  who  enter  this  holy  place, 
pray  for  the  sinner  who  built  it."  But  when  satisfied  that  the 
founder  was  alive  and  insisted  that  such  an  inscription  should 
be  placed  there,  he  grudgingly  gave  way,  only  stipulating  that 
should  the  donor  die  whilst  he  was  Bishop  of  Ripon,  he  should 
be  informed  of  the  fact  so  that  he  might  order  the  erasure.1 

Another  difficulty  was  connected  with  the  sacramental  plate, 
and  a  story  pertains  to  one  chalice,  which  must  oe  told. 

Both  the  chalices  were  encrusted  on  stem,  boss,  and  foot  with 
pearls,  diamonds,  rubies,  and  enamel.  The  plate  was  the 
offering  of  two  young  ladies  and  their  brother,  children  of  Dr. 
Pusey,  one  of  the  girls,  Lucy,  being  only  fifteen  at  the  time  of 
her  death.    On  this  topic,  the  Rev.  Isaac  Williams  wrote : 

"  A  friend  (i.e.  Dr.  Pusey)  said  to  me,  '  My  little  girl — she  was 
ten  years  old — was  gathering  pebbles  on  the  beach  with  other 
children ;  they  were  looking  for  a  sort  of  agate  found  on  that 
coast,  but  she  had  another  end  in  view.  She  brought  me  this 
one,  marked  with  the  cross,  and  to  find  this  had  been  her 
object.' 

"As  a  much  younger  child  her  chief  pleasure  in  any  object 
of  sight,  or  in  dress,  was  to  see,  as  so  often  may  be  seen,  some 

1  This  became  very  dirty  and  has  been  removed,  and  the  inscription, 
deeply  incised  in  stone,  is  now  on  the  floor  as  one  enters  the  west  doorway. 


S.  SAVIOUR'S,  LEEDS 


271 


form  of  the  cross.  Never  perhaps,  he  often  said,  was  there 
an  eye  so  quick  and  so  glad  to  discern  the  cross,  and  the 
inward  eye  saw  and  owned  the  cross  as  well  as  the  outward. 
As  the  cross  had  been  gently  laid  upon  her  by  her  heavenly 
Father  during  life,  and  had,  as  it  ever  does,  borne  her,  while 
borne  by  her,  so  was  it  her  stay  in  death.  The  Church  of  Holy 
Cross,  as  it  was  then  called,  is  inseparably  connected  with  the 
memory  of  this  child.  Of  the  plate  given  for  the  altar,  part  was 
the  fruit  of  her  self-denial  in  life,  part  her  gift  in  death.  At 
her  wish  it  was  enriched  with  the  cross,  and  the  last  thought 
connected  with  this  earth  that  interested  her,  the  day  before 
her  departure,  was  the  crosses  she  loved,  on  the  design  which 
then  arrived,  for  the  jewelled  chalice,  on  which  her  thin  fingers 
rested." 

The  legend  at  the  base  was  to  have  been  inscribed,  "  Be  merci- 
ful, O  Lord,  to  Lucy" — the  donor,  together  with  her  brother 
and  sister.  But  as  Lucy  was  dead  the  Bishop  forbade  the 
inscription,  and  at  the  last  moment  it  had  to  be  altered. 

Then  the  Bishop  demurred  to  a  representation  in  the  west 
window  of  the  Sacred  Face,  and  this  had  to  be  altered  to 
satisfy  his  scruples.  He  objected  also  to  the  altar  linen,  because 
covering  only  the  mensa,  and  not  draping  the  whole  altar. 

Next  he  objected  to  consecrate  the  church  on  Holy  Cross 
Day,  lest  he  should  commit  himself  to  recognition  of  the  genuine- 
ness of  the  cross  recovered  from  the  Saracens  by  Heraclius  in 
629.  Accordingly  the  consecration  had  to  be  deferred  to  the 
Feast  of  S.  Simon  and  Jude,  1845.  The  offertory  amounted  to 
£985,  which,  at  the  founder's  desire,  was  set  apart  towards  the 
erection  of  a  new  church  in  York  Road,  the  first  incumbent 
of  which  became  the  most  venomous  enemy  of  S.  Saviour's, 
and  the  delator  of  all  supposed  misdemeanours  to  Dr.  Hook  and 
the  Bishop  of  Ripon. 

Dr.  Hook,  although  he  consented  to  attend  the  consecration, 
objected  to  the  preachers  appointed  for  the  Octave,  as  having 
been  associated  with  Mr.  Newman,  who  had  recently  seceded. 
They  were  Keble,  Upton  Richards,  Charles  Marriott,  Isaac 
Williams,  Dodsworth,  and  Pusey  himself.  Eventually  all  of 
these  men  remained  loyally  in  the  English  Church  with  the 
exception  of  Dodsworth.  And  previous  to  the  Consecration, 
Hook,  with  two-thirds  of  the  clergy  of  Leeds,  signed  a  declara- 
tion against  what  they  supposed  was  a  Romanizing  tendency 
observable  in  a  section  of  the  Church. 


272 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


The  church,  as  already  stated,  was  cruciform.  Its  great 
blemish  is  the  chancel,  which  is  42  feet  long  by  16  feet  wide. 
In  consequence  of  the  heaviness  of  the  oak  screen,  which  cut  off 
the  sound  from  the  body  of  the  church,  the  choir  had  to  sit  out- 
side. This  choir  was  not  surpliced  or  put  into  cassocks  till  1848 ; 
a  white  stole  was  not  introduced  in  place  of  the  funereal  scarves 
till  the  Christmas  of  1849 ;  coloured  altar-cloths  did  not  make 
their  appearance  till  1848  (previously  there  had  been  one  only — 
violet) ;  and  it  was  not  till  1859 that  an  altar-cross  was  obtained, 
lighted  candles  were  introduced,  and  the  Eucharistic  vestments 
were  procured.  Consequently  one  cannot  regard  S.  Saviour's  as 
having  in  those  early  days  been  a  leading  Ritualistic  church. 

In  1890  a  lighter  screen  was  substituted  for  the  former,  and 
now  the  choir  occupies  the  chancel.  An  instance  of  Dr.  Pusey's 
conservative  instincts  was  noticeable  with  reference  to  the 
reredos.  He  was  very  persistent  in  his  desire  that  it  should 
consist  of  the  Tables  of  the  Commandments.  He  held,  and 
probably  with  reason,  that  the  introduction  of  the  Command- 
ments into  the  Communion  Service,  and  the  injunction  that 
they  should  be  set  up  at  the  East  end  of  every  church,  was  a 
protest  of  the  Reformers  against  the  antinomian  tendency  of 
the  Lutheran  doctrine  of  the  Justification. 

The  church  had  been  built  and  consecrated,  but  the  amount 
of  tithe  apportioned  to  it  was  £36  9s.,  and  the  expense  of  col- 
lecting that  sum  would  swallow  it  up.  Dr.  Pusey  put  down 
£1,000  for  endowment,  the  interest  of  which,  £30,  came  to  the 
vicar.  £150  was  paid  by  a  well-wisher  as  a  curate's  stipend ; 
so  here  was  the  church  with  no  adequate  endowment,  planted 
in  the  midst  of  a  poor  population,  and  supposed  to  be  worked 
by  four  priests  on  next  to  nothing. 

Even  before  the  consecration,  Dr.  Hook  began  to  entertain 
doubts  about  it.  Properly  he  had  no  right  to  interfere  with 
the  church  and  the  services,  as  it  was  entirely  independent  of 
him.  But  for  years  he  continued  to  be  incessantly  meddling, 
listening  to  all  sorts  of  gossip  concerning  the  proceedings  of  the 
clergy,  and  reporting  them  to  the  Bishop,  without  any  attempt 
to  investigate  whether  they  were  true  or  false.  He  took  excep- 
tion at  once  to  some  of  the  arrangements  of  the  church.  He  had 
expected  that  the  services  would  be  of  the  cathedral  pattern, 
the  very  last  suited  to  a  Missionary  Church  among  uneducated 
people.  S.  Saviour's  was  at  a  humble  distance  to  follow  the 
usages  of  the  parish  church  of  S.  Peter's. 


S.  SAVIOUR'S,  LEEDS 


273 


It  was  not  the  ritual  of  S.  Saviour's  that  was  objected  to,  for 
there  was  practically  none  ;  it  was  the  insistence  on  Confession 
that  roused  the  anger  of  Dr.  Hook.  Amidst  the  awful  wicked- 
ness that  prevailed  in  the  district,  it  was  necessary  to  urge  it. 
Nothing  could  combat  it,  and  conquer  it  piecemeal,  but  the 
Ministry  of  the  Keys,  and  getting  into  the  confidence  of  the 
poor  lads  and  lasses  who  worked  in  the  mills  and  were  sur- 
•  rounded  by  evil  influences. 

Dr.  Hook  had  done  a  marvellous  work  at  Coventry,  and,  above 
all,  had  begun  one  at  Leeds,  and  such  as  the  S.  Saviour's  clergy 
would  have  been  incompetent  to  accomplish.  They,  on  the 
other  hand,  by  their  saintly  life  of  self-sacrifice  did  a  spiritual 
work  for  which  he  was  not  calculated.  There  were  a  lack  of 
wisdom  and  considerable  imprudence  in  the  S.  Saviour's  clergy, 
and  there  was  a  deficiency  of  forbearance  on  the  part  of  Dr. 
Hook ;  but  he  was  alarmed  and  pained  at  seeing  and  feeling  the 
disquiet  of  his  own  flock,  who  blamed  him  for  the  proceedings 
at  S.  Saviour's,  which  he  could  not  control. 

The  first  vicar  was  Richard  Ward  in  1846.  Mr.  Ward  had 
been  a  curate  at  the  parish  church,  and  had  been  recommended 
by  Dr.  Hook.  This  fact  became  an  additional  source  of  vexa- 
tion to  him,  and  a  handle  to  his  adversaries,  when  things  began 
to  go  badly.  Mr.  Cazenove,  a  layman,  came  to  S.  Saviour's 
as  a  helper.  He  remained  staunch,  and  finally  became  Warden 
of  Cumbrae  College.  Mr.  Cazenove  was  ordained  deacon  on 
Trinity  Sunday.  In  September,  Mr.  G.  Case  was  ordained  to 
S.  Saviour's,  and  soon  after  came  Mr.  R.  Macmullen,  who  proved 
an  eloquent  preacher.  He  was  Fellow  of  Corpus  Christi  College, 
Oxford,  and  was  sent  to  S.  Saviour's  by  Dr.  Pusey. 

In  October,  after  the  first  anniversary  of  the  Dedication,  a 
wealthy  layman,  named  Haigh,  a  Leeds  wool  merchant,  joined 
the  society.  He  had  just  come  into  possession  of  £30,000,  and 
he  proposed  to  spend  the  sum  of  £10,000  to  £12,000  on  the 
building  of  the  church  in  York  Road.  The  foundation  was 
duly  laid,  and  Mr.  Macmullen  preached  at  S.  Saviour's  on  the 
ensuing  All  Saints'  Day  on  the  subject  of  u  intercessory  prayer 
by  the  Saints  below  and  above."  Towards  the  close  of  his 
sermon  occurred  words  to  this  effect :  "  What  comfort  to  us 
who  are  struggling,  to  know  that  the  prayers  of  those  who 
have  reached  the  Eternal  Shore  are  offered  on  our  behalf;  for 
those  who  covet  purity  of  heart  to  remember  that  the  Blessed 
Virgin  is  interceding  for  them;  for  the  penitent  to  think  of 
18 


274 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


S.  Peter  asking  pardon  for  those  who  have  denied  their  Lord; 
for  the  Christian  priest,  toiling  for  souls,  to  know  that  the 
Apostle  of  the  Gentiles,  once  in  labours  abundant  on  earth, 
now  pleads  in  Heaven  the  cause  of  those  who  strive  to  follow 
his  steps !  " 

To  the  best  of  my  knowledge,  this  was  the  extent  to  which 
Mr.  Macmullen  went ;  but  Dr.  Hook  accused  him  to  the  Bishop 
of  having  preached  on  the  Invocation  of  Saints.  Dr.  Hook 
had  not  heard  the  sermon,  he  judged  from  what  was  reported 
to  him.  If  Mr.  Macmullen  had  said  no  more  than  the  above 
passage  that  has  been  preserved,  Dr.  Longley  could  not  well 
say  that  this  was  repugnant  to  the  teaching  of  the  English 
Church,  for  Bishop  Pearson  in  one  of  his  sermons  had  said : 
"  If  we  cut  off  all  intercession  of  angels  and  saints  for  us  living 
on  earth,  and  striving  with  the  host  of  evil  spirits — if  we  acknow- 
ledge no  power  at  all  before  the  throne  of  God,  of  the  martyrs 
who  poured  forth  their  lives  for  Christ — what  that  Church  may 
be  with  which  we  can  hold  communion,  I  am  wholly  ignorant." 

Nevertheless,  without  giving  any  reason  for  so  doing,  the 
Bishop  inhibited  Mr.  Macmullen  from  all  priestly  functions  in 
the  diocese.  On  hearing  of  this  injustice,  Mr.  Haigh  refused  to 
assist  any  further  in  the  erection  of  the  church,  and  both  seceded 
to  the  Roman  Communion,  and  were  received  on  New  Year's 
Day,  1847.1 

Mr.  Ward  had  printed  a  tract  on  the  Holy  Eucharist  in 
which  he  had  used  very  incautious  and  overstrained  expressions. 
Dr.  Hook  charged  the  clergy  of  S.  Saviour's  with  "  a  systematic 
depreciation  of  the  Church  of  England,  and  a  defence  of  the 
Church  of  Rome  ;  one  of  the  clergy  going  so  far  as  to  say  that 
to  speak  against  the  Church  of  Rome  was  a  mortal  sin,  and 
lamenting  that  his  lot  had  been  cast  in  the  Church  of  England." 
But  the  Vicar  of  Leeds  had  this  only  on  tittle-tattle  report, 
probably  false  or  grossly  exaggerated.  Dean  Stephens,  his 
biographer,  admits  :  "  The  Vicar  was  at  times  hasty  in  his 
judgments,  inaccurate  in  his  statements,  and  over- vehement 
in  his  language." 

Distressed  at  the  defection  of  Macmullen,  Mr.  Ward  incau- 

1  Macmullen  said  that  it  was  due  to  Dr.  Hook  that  he  went  over  to  Rome  ; 
indeed,  those  working  at  S.  Saviour's  knew  as  a  matter  of  fact  that  they 
were  winning  souls  for  Christ,  rescuing  them  from  depths  of  horrible 
wickedness,  and  they  considered  that  the  Bishop,  Dr.  Hook,  and  the 
whole  Episcopate  were  opposing  a  great  spiritual  work.  It  was  this  more 
than  anything  else  that  led  them  to  quit  the  Church  of  England. 


S.  SAVIOUR'S,  LEEDS 


275 


tiously  placed  himself  unconditionally  in  the  hands  of  Dr. 
Longley,  offering  to  make  any  alterations  in  the  conduct  of  the 
services  that  the  Bishop  desired.  The  Bishop  seized  on  the 
opportunity,  and  required  Mr.  Ward  to  resign  the  vicarship 
and  Mr.  Case  the  curacy  of  S.  Saviour's.  The  Vicar  remon- 
strated— he  said  that  he  had  never  contemplated  so  great  a 
demand  being  made.  The  parishioners  sent  a  petition  to  his 
Lordship,  entreating  to  have  their  vicar  and  friend  spared 
them,  but  met  with  a  blunt  refusal.  Mr.  Ward  had  no  choice 
but  to  submit,  and  he  preached  his  farewell  sermon  on  the  last 
day  of  January  1847.  Mr.  Case,  of  course,  also  had  to  go. 
Mr.  Ward  went  into  Somersetshire  and,  some  years  after,  he 
and  his  friend  Case  joined  the  Church  of  Rome. 

After  the  short  period  of  fifteen  months,  the  living,  which 
had  been  offered  to  several  and  declined,  was  accepted  in  the 
summer  of  1847  by  the  Rev.  A.  P.  Forbes.  He  lived  alone 
in  the  Vicarage,  the  schoolmaster  and  his  wife  keeping  house 
for  him.  He  could  get  no  curates.  The  church  was  generally 
condemned  by  the  authorities,  and,  as  an  important  dignitary 
expressed  it,  a  cordon  sanitaire  was  drawn  round  the  place  by 
the  neighbouring  clergy.  Mr.  Forbes  was  not  strong,  and  his 
health  suffered  from  the  quantity  of  work  falling  to  the  lot  of 
a  single  resident  priest. 

In  the  same  year  the  Irish  fever  came  to  Leeds  and  proved 
very  deadly.  Mr.  Forbes  was  constant  in  visiting  the  hospitals 
during  the  prevalence  of  the  disease.  The  Rev.  Stanley  Mark, 
a  young  curate  to  Dr.  Hook,  caught  the  fever  and  died.  So  did 
three  Roman  priests,  one  after  another,  from  the  same  disease. 

In  September  of  the  same  year,  the  Rev.  A.  P.  Forbes  was 
elected  to  the  see  of  Brechin,  in  Scotland,  by  the  clergy  of  the 
diocese,  so  that  now  a  new  vicar  had  to  be  found.  And  during 
the  interregnum  the  Rev.  J.  H.  Pollen,  Fellow  of  Merton,  came 
to  take  charge.  Dr.  Hook  was  of  opinion  that  two  clergy  would 
suffice  at  S.  Saviour's.  He  told  Mr.  Pollen  on  his  arrival  that 
there  were  but  seven  people  sick  in  it.  Mr.  Pollen,  however, 
found  the  case  very  different,  as,  soon  after  he  came,  he  num- 
bered at  least  forty  cases  requiring  his  frequent  ministrations. 

The  living  was  now  given  to  the  Rev.  T.  Minster,  chaplain  to 
Viscount  Campden,  an  earnest  but  very  delicate  man,  suffering 
from  an  internal  ailment.  He  was  inducted  in  April  1848, 
and  was  the  third  vicar  from  the  Consecration— a  time  of  about 
two  years  and  a  half. 


276 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


The  difficulty  of  finding  a  curate  now  recurred.  The  Rev.  G. 
Crawley  was  proposed  and  eventually,  after  some  demur,  accepted 
by  the  Bishop,  and  then  the  Rev.  F.  Beckett,  Mr.  Minster's 
former  curate,  joined  him.  The  little  party  was  enlarged  by 
the  adhesion  of  Mr.  Seton  Rooke,  a  layman  preparing  for  Orders. 

The  discipline  and  conduct  of  the  house  and  of  the  services 
were  now  resumed.  Besides  the  regular  clerical  staff,  there 
were  other  clergy,  either  temporarily  residing  in  the  Vicarage 
or  visiting  it  from  neighbouring  churches.  The  parish  was 
thoroughly  organized,  each  clergyman  and  layman  had  a  district 
assigned  to  him,  and  there  seemed  to  be  every  prospect  of  a 
great  future  for  S.  Saviour's.  The  Vicar,  however,  owing  to 
his  illness,  was  mostly  non-resident,  and  Mr.  Beckett  was  gener- 
ally regarded  as  the  superior.  And  now  it  was  for  the  first  time 
that  the  choir  was  surpliced.  Fresh  complaints  reached  the 
Bishop :  often  enough  Dr.  Hook  was  the  intermediary.  It 
appeared  that  at  Baptisms  in  the  afternoon,  in  that  black, 
soot-laden  atmosphere,  and  with  the  stained-glass  windows 
admitting  little  light,  it  had  become  customary  for  two  choir- 
boys to  attend  the  priest  at  the  font  with  candles,  often  abso- 
lutely necessary.  The  Bishop  ordered  their  discontinuance,  and 
discontinued  they  were.  Then  followed  complaints  that  Con- 
fession was  taught  and  practised.  Again  the  Bishop  interfered 
and  forbade  Confessions  except  as  preliminary  to  Communion. 

The  dissatisfaction  of  Dr.  Hook  continued  to  increase,  and 
he  treated  the  S.  Saviour's  clergy  with  icy  coldness.  The 
Bishop  had  the  bad  taste  to  tell  Mr.  Minster  this  :  "  You  are  a 
plague-spot  in  my  diocese." 

Dr.  Hook  was  like  a  good  many  other  men  who  cannot  abide 
to  see  things  done  a  little  differently  from  their  own  way.  But 
he  was  placed,  as  already  said,  in  a  difficult  position.  He 
desired,  and  rightly,  to  retain  the  confidence  of  his  flock,  and 
he  feared  that  he  might  forfeit  this  through  the  eccentricities  of 
the  clergy  of  S.  Saviour's.  To  add  to  his  troubles,  one  of  his 
own  curates  resigned  and  seceded  to  Rome  in  1848. 

His  church  of  S.  Peter's  was  attended  by  the  well-to-do 
of  Leeds,  rich  manufacturers,  merchants,  and  tradesmen,  who 
wanted  a  comfortable,  not  a  comforting  religion — they  had  no 
troubles,  spiritual  or  social,  that  cried  out  for  consolation.  They 
were  given  a  florid  musical  service,  and  as  much  Church  doc- 
trine as  the  Vicar  deemed  expedient,  or  as  much  as  his  people 
could  digest  at  a  time.    He  warned  them  that  by  the  malignant 


S.  SAVIOUR'S,  LEEDS 


277 


the  events  that  had  taken  place  at  S.  Saviour's  would  be  repre- 
sented as  the  results  of  principles  inculcated  from  the  pulpit 
of  the  parish  church.  "It  is  well,  therefore,  for  you  to  be 
reminded  of  what  you  are  well  aware,  that  the  principles 
inculcated  here  are,  and,  while  life  lasts  to  me,  ever  shall  be, 
the  same — the  good  old  principles  of  the  Church  of  England, 
equally  removed  from  Puritanism  or  Popery.  I  confidently  rely 
on  the  generous  support  of  my  whole  flock."  Tormented  as  he 
was  by  the  proceedings  of  the  S.  Saviour's  clergy,  "  hornets," 
as  he  styled  them,  and  by  the  attacks  of  the  Evangelicals,  Dis- 
senters, and  the  Radical  Leeds  press,  he  was  driven  to  use  more 
violent  language  than  was  fair,  and  to  act  in  a  measure  bitterly 
hostile  to  the  clergy  of  the  unfortunate  church  on  the  hill.  That 
the  services  at  S.  Peter's  would  not  suffice  for  the  mill-folk 
of  the  "Bank,"  he  could  not  understand.  Owing  to  Mr. 
Minster's  health  being  so  bad,  another  curate  was  urgently 
needed,  but  the  Bishop  was  obstructive,  and  refused  to  license 
every  one  who  offered  for  S.  Saviour's.  Mr.  Rooke  was  now 
ready  to  receive  Orders,  but  the  Bishop  would  not  license  him 
to  the  church,  and  he  was  ordained  to  Shad  well.  However,  he 
spent  a  great  part  of  his  time  at  S.  Saviour's. 

In  1846-7  occurred  the  Irish  famine  already  alluded  to,  caused 
by  the  failure  of  the  potato  crop.  In  four  years  the  population 
of  Ireland  decreased  by  more  than  a  million  and  a  half.  Many 
perished  in  their  own  land,  many  emigrated  to  the  United 
States  ;  and  a  third  section  invaded  the  manufacturing  towns 
of  England  and  Scotland.  Swarms  arrived  in  Leeds,  famished, 
in  rags,  and  without  money.  At  that  period  the  drainage  and 
water-supply  were  all  in  the  most  primitive  condition,  and 
these  immigrants  crowded  under  any  roof,  and  down  into 
cellars,  or  up  in  attics,  wherever  they  could  obtain  shelter. 
Such  as  could  obtain  no  lodging  in  a  house  erected  shanties  in 
the  courts  and  alleys  of  a  densely  urban  quarter,  with  no 
thought  of  the  decencies  of  life.  The  result  was  that  a  terrible 
outbreak  of  typhus  fever  ensued.  The  Rev.  E.  Jackson,  in 
his  Pastor's  Recollections,  describes  right  vividly  the  condition 
of  affairs.    He  speaks  of  : 

"  Tall  men,  with  long  coats  and  hats  without  crowns,  and 
women,  wild  and  haggard,  with  numbers  of  unearthly-looking 
children— strange  beings  that  ran  alongside  of  the  men  and 
women,  and  looked  at  you  out  of  the  corner  of  their  eyes,  with 
a  sort  of  half-frightened,  half -savage  expression. 


278 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


"  The  usual  low  lodging-houses  for  this  class  of  people  were 
soon  more  than  full.  Why  the  Poor  Law  Authorities  did  not 
bestir  themselves  in  time,  and  open  proper  places  for  the  recep- 
tion of  these  wretched  exiles,  seems  now  a  strange  blunder. 
Being  Irish,  I  suppose  they  were  not  legally  chargeable  to  the 
township.  But  it  was  a  great  mistake  and  a  woeful  economy, 
for  the  emigrants  brought  with  them  not  only  hunger  but 
death.  In  a  very  short  time  the  frightful  Irish  fever  was  epidemic 
in  all  the  lower  parts  of  the  town.  It  was  a  dreadful  time. 
We  then  buried  all  the  pauper  dead  from  the  parish  church, 
and  I  well  remember  that  on  one  afternoon  twenty-three  bodies 
were  lying  side  by  side  as  I  entered  the  church  to  read  that 
part  of  the  burial  service  which  is  there  said.  The  low  howls 
of  the  women  were  terrible.  They  sat  by  the  gravesides,  crouch- 
ing in  their  peculiar  way,  and  rocking  themselves  to  and  fro, 
as  they  looked  down  into  the  dark  cavities  where  the  dead  were 
lowered,  five  and  six  deep,  one  upon  another. 

"  '  Do  go  with  me  and  see  a  part  of  my  district,'  Mr.  Monk, 
the  new  curate,  said  to  me  one  day.  I  went  with  him.  It 
was  frightful  indeed.  Here,  in  this  district,  which  was  one  of 
an  especially  Irish  character,  it  was  simply  horrible.  Every 
place  above  ground,  and  underground,  was  crammed  with 
miserable,  famished  wretches,  scarcely  looking  like  human  beings. 
In  one  cellar  we  counted  thirty-one  men,  women,  and  children, 
all  lying  on  the  damp,  filthy  floor,  with  only  a  few  handfuls  of 
straw  under  them  ;  while  the  frightened  neighbours,  who  would 
not  venture  inside  the  pestilential  depths,  were  lowering  water 
in  buckets  to  allay  the  intolerable  thirst  of  the  miserable  people. 
Our  young  curate  would  himself  go  down  to  them  in  their  cellars, 
or  climb  up  into  their  close,  choking  chamber,  raise  their  heads, 
put  fresh  straw  under  them,  and  give  them  gruel  with  his  own 
hands." 

The  young  curate,  the  Rev.  W.  S.  Monk,  a  member  of  a 
noble  family,  fell  a  victim  to  his  devotion,  caught  the  fever, 
and  died  on  July  ri,  1847. 

This  is  a  graphic  picture  of  what  took  place  in  the  district 
of  S.  James's.  It  was  precisely  the  same  in  that  of  S.  Saviour's, 
and  there  also  the  clergy  laboured  with  incessant  energy  and 
the  utmost  devotion.  This  Irish  fever  was  but  a  prelude  to 
another  epidemic — the  cholera. 

Efforts  had  been  made  for  some  time  past  to  obtain  from  the 
Board  of  Works  the  drainage  of  the  worst  portions  of  the  town, 


S.  SAVIOUR'S,  LEEDS 


279 


but  the  measure  was  doggedly  resisted  by  one  of  the  wealthiest 
mill-owners  in  the  S.  Saviour's  district,  on  account  of  the  neces- 
sary outlay.  When  the  cholera  did  come,  this  man  was  stricken 
and  died.  The  mill  was  closed  for  the  half -day  when  he  was 
buried,  the  work-people  were  dismissed  with  half  a  day's  wages. 
Not  till  more  of  the  rich  had  died  did  the  Board  of  Works  move 
in  the  matter  ;  then,  when  the  worst  of  the  mortality  from  the 
typhus  was  over,  there  fell  on  England  the  awful  scourge  of 
cholera  in  1849.  ^  was  more  severe  in  the  parish  of  S.  Saviour 
than  in  any  other  part  of  Leeds.  The  disease  spread  rapidly, 
and  there  were  deaths  in  every  house.  It  struck  people  at  all 
times,  and  lasted  in  each  case  an  average  of  ten  hours.  The 
greater  number  died.  Curiously  enough,  it  was  mainly  those  in 
the  prime  of  life  who  were  struck  down.  Whole  families  were 
swept  away.  The  clergy  were  soon  in  the  thick  of  it  ;  night 
and  day  were  they  at  the  bedsides  of  the  sick  and  the  dying, 
ministering  both  to  body  and  soul.  Where  no  one  else  would 
go  to  render  assistance,  for  fear  of  infection,  there  were  the 
clergy.  It  was  through  this  self-sacrificing  devotion  that  they 
won  the  love  and  respect  of  the  entire  parish. 

Mr.  Pollen,  knowing  how  hard  pressed  the  clergy  were,  volun- 
teered to  come  to  S.  Saviour's  to  help.  The  people  swarmed 
out  of  their  houses  and  burnt  tar-barrels  in  the  streets.  As 
many  as  ten  persons,  on  the  average,  died  every  day  in  the  parish. 
The  church  was  open  all  day,  and  the  Litany  said  regularly 
at  12.40  p.m.  A  daily  celebration  was  also  instituted.  The 
Vicarage  as  well  was  kept  open  all  day,  and  all  available  funds 
were  invested  in  blankets  and  medicines.  The  people  naturally 
leaned  on  the  clergy  in  their  distress,  and  always  obtained  the 
help  they  needed.  The  priests  went  about  in  their  cassocks, 
carrying  in  their  girdles  calomel,  cayenne  pepper,  camphor,  etc. 
The  days  and  nights  were  passed  by  them  in  hastening  from  one 
sick-bed  to  another,  speaking  words  of  comfort  here,  praying 
with  the  sufferers  there,  rubbing  the  men's  cold  extremities, 
laying  out  that  person's  dead  body. 

Mr.  Pollen  has  recorded  in  his  notes  many  sad  cases — too 
many  in  which  there  was  little  spiritual  consolation  and  hope, 
but  not  all. 

"  By  twelve  o'clock  each  of  us  had  seen  his  patients.  Some 
were,  perhaps,  past  motion  or  speech  j  these  were  to  be  watched, 
and  commended,  as  they  sank  into  death,  to  the  hands  of  the 
Creator.    Some  hopeful  case  there  might  be — but  usually  after 


280 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


twenty-four  hours  the  sick  were  a  fresh  set ;  that  of  yesterday 
needed  but  the  mercy  of  burial. 

"  The  priest  often  stayed  to  lay  out  the  body  and  burn 
disinfectants  round  the  bed  ;  soon  after  came  the  undertakers 
with  a  cart  and  went  in ;  at  the  sight  of  them  every  one  stopped 
short  in  the  street,  and  went  off  by  another  way.  The  windows 
were  opened,  and  the  bedding  and  clothes  of  the  dead  were  thrown 
out.  Then,  from  five  till  after  dark,  the  workhouse  single-horse 
hearses  went  round  to  convey  the  coffins  to  a  distant  burial- 
ground.  The  worst  of  the  cholera  lay  close  round  the  Vicarage, 
not  thirty  feet  from  its  walls  ;  eight  houses  continuously,  close 
at  the  gate,  were  shut  and  tenantless.  Above  the  low  wall 
nodded  the  black  feathers,  in  a  slow,  perpetual  stream. 

"  There  was  no  long  interval  of  rest.  By  half-past  one  or 
two,  all  were  out  again  upon  their  various  stations,  until  half- 
past  seven,  the  hour  for  evening  service.  At  five  o'clock,  I  know 
not  why,  the  plot  usually  thickened.  The  clergy  were  stopped 
in  the  street — '  A  young  woman  next  door  ' — '  A  young  man  in 
the  house  opposite.'  Thus  passed  the  afternoon.  After  a  day 
of  such  anxiety,  the  choral  service  was  refreshing,  the  seemly 
white  of  the  choir-boys,  the  rough  Gregorian  chant,  the  spirited 
hymn,  brought  home  the  thoughts  and  invigorated  the  spirits 
for  the  night  work.  More  than  once  a  quiet  step  stole  up  to 
the  bench  of  clergy,  to  communicate  some  message  in  a  whisper ; 
one  of  the  number  would  set  down  his  book  and  step  out." 

Among  the  many  cases  that  occurred,  I  have  room  for  two 
only: 

"  Sad  was  the  case  of  a  young  girl  left  dying  in  the  hospital. 
She  had  run  away  from  her  grandfather  to  another  girl,  a 
friend  in  Leeds,  who  told  her  of  large  wages.  ...  A  night  she 
resisted,  then  she  fell ;  a  few  days  after  she  was  taken  with  the 
cholera. 

"  Between  three  and  four  one  night  came  a  summons.  The 
priest  found  on  her  deathbed  a  beautiful  girl  of  fourteen,  suffer- 
ing much,  but  perfectly  conscious.  Her  father,  a  very  tall  and 
fine  man,  in  his  dyer's  dress  stained  with  indigo,  had  just  been 
summoned  from  his  work.  He  had  left  her  perfectly  well  the 
preceding  afternoon.  She  was  his  eldest  daughter,  he  said, 
and  kept  house  for  him  ;  her  mother  was  dead.  He  put  strong 
restraint  upon  himself,  and  spoke  at  times  cheerfully ;  but  every 
now  and  then  he  gave  way  to  passionate  bursts  of  tears,  and 
kissed  his  poor  child  again  and  again.    The  bystanders  tried  to 


S.  SAVIOUR'S,  LEEDS 


281 


prevent  him,  fearing  lest  he  should  take  the  infection  ;  but  in 
vain.  She  was  very  devout  ;  she  asked  her  father  to  be  good 
to  her  brothers  and  sisters  ;  in  the  evening  she  was  dead."  1 

Mr.  Minster  was  seized  with  the  epidemic.  "  If  I  am  taken," 
said  he  to  one  of  his  brother  clergy,  "  treat  me  in  our  approved 
way."  An  hour  later,  a  young  man  came  to  the  cottage  where 
his  friend  was,  and  said  :  "  Mr.  Minster  is  very  ill."  The  two 
hastened  to  him,  and  loaded  blankets  upon  him  to  keep  in  the 
vital  heat ;  calomel  was  administered,  and  the  Office  for  the 
Visitation  of  the  Sick  said  over  him.  Before  midnight  all 
danger  was  happily  over. 

There  was  not  an  hour  of  the  night  at  which  a  summons  did 
not  come.  The  clergy  that  were  in  went  in  turn.  The  Vicar 
lay  on  the  ground  floor,  but  sleep  left  his  eyes,  and  night  after 
night  he  would  lie  hearing  the  knocks  and  cries  at  the  door, 
but  himself  unable  to  rise.  Two  small  hospitals  in  the  town 
were  devoted  to  the  cholera  patients,  and  one  of  the  S.  Saviour's 
clergy  visited  them  daily. 

Dr.  Hook  had  not  been  in  Leeds  during  the  greater  part  of 
the  time  of  the  visitation,  but  he  returned  when  it  was  abating. 
As  he  strode  one  day  through  the  hospital  wards,  he  encountered 
Mr.  Pollen,  who  had  been  ministering  to  a  dying  man,  and 
roughly  asked  him  how  he  came  there,  and  whether  he  had  the 
Bishop's  licence.  He  had  not  the  licence,  he  had  come  in  haste 
to  help  in  an  emergency.  Dr.  Hook  at  once  delated  him  to 
Dr.  Longley. 

When  Alexandria  was  swept  by  plague,  the  patriarch  S. 
Dionysius  was  in  the  midst,  exhorting  and  encouraging  priests 
and  people.  Who  does  not  remember  the  graphic  account  by 
Manzoni  of  Frederick  Borromeo,  Cardinal  Archbishop  of  Milan, 
and  his  heroic  devotion  to  the  sick  and  dying  when  the  city  was 
smitten  with  plague  in  1576  ?  During  the  Plague  of  London,  1666, 
Archbishop  Sheldon  remained  at  Lambeth  and  used  his  vast 
influence  to  provide  aid  for  the  sufferers,  and  preserved  numbers 
who  but  for  him  would  have  perished.  So  also  Tillotson,  Bishop 
of  London,  stuck  to  his  post,  and  was  indefatigable  in  his 
labours  on  behalf  of  the  stricken.  When,  in  1720,  the  plague 
raged  in  Marseilles,  Bishop  Belzunce  was  there,  seated  by  the 
dying,  bowed  over  them,  hearing  their  confessions,  and  stimu- 
lating the  clergy  by  his  example  to  self-sacrifice.  And  so,  at  the 
present  day,  I  have  not  the  smallest  doubt  that  most  of  our 
1  John  Hungerford  Pollen  (London,  1912),  p.  155. 


282 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


English  bishops  would  be  foremost  in  encouraging  their  clergy 
and  ministering  to  the  plague-stricken.  But  such  was  not  the 
conception  of  his  office  entertained  by  Dr.  Longley.  His  func- 
tion was,  from  his  well-padded  arm-chair  in  the  palace  by 
Ripon,  to  criticize  and  chide.  He  wrote  to  Mr.  Minster  :  "1 
am  exceedingly  concerned  to  hear  the  report,  confirmed  by 
yourself,  that  you  had  invited  Mr.  Pollen  to  become  an  in- 
mate of  S.  Saviour's  during  the  autumn.  It  is  a  matter  of 
the  deepest  regret  that  you  should  have  identified  yourself 
with  him." 

Mr.  Minster  replied:  "I  am  sorry  Mr.  Pollen's  assistance 
during  the  time  of  cholera  should  have  met  with  your  Lordship's 
disapprobation.  He  volunteered  to  assist  me.  At  the  time,  I 
myself  was  nearly  disabled,  and  soon  after  completely  so,  by  an 
attack  of  cholera  ;  when,  too,  Mr.  Rooke  was  confined  to  his  bed 
by  an  attack  of  low  fever,  and  Mr.  Beckett,  from  overwork  and 
exhaustion,  was  scarcely  able  to  keep  on  his  legs.  At  this 
time  my  people  were  being  literally  decimated.  I  could  not 
see  my  people  die  in  numbers  daily,  and  no  one  to  assist  them 
and  comfort  them." 

The  Bishop  coldly  replied :  "  I  can  only  hope  that  Mr. 
Pollen  will  not  again  offer  his  services  at  S.  Saviour's,  and 
that  you  will  not  be  tempted  to  accept  them." 

Mr.  Minster's  health  was  never  restored,  and  he  had  to  ask 
of  the  Bishop  a  year's  non-residence,  which  was  granted,  with 
leave  to  seek  a  temporary  substitute,  but  none  could  or  would 
now  come  to  help.  Mr.  Rooke  was  ordained  priest,  with  a 
decided  order  from  the  Bishop  that  he  was  not  to  teach  or  hear 
private  confessions. 

The  Bishop  himself  had  called  on  Mr.  Minster,  and  during 
a  long  conversation  on  Confession,  told  him  how  strongly  he 
objected  to  the  practice.  Mr.  Minster  asked  what  could  he 
do  but  receive  such  as  had  been  invited  in  the  exhortation  in 
the  Communion  service  to  come — and  who  came  in  response. 
He  inquired  what  his  Lordship  would  do  in  like  cases.  "  I 
should  ask  them  to  sit  down  and  beg  them  to  begin  their  story," 
replied  Dr.  Longley. 

"  And  how,  my  Lord,  if  they  desired  Absolution  ?  " 

"  I  think  I  should  read  out  to  them  the  Comfortable  Words." 

When  the  cholera  had  raged  for  three  months  and  ceased, 
then  some  of  the  poor  people  who  had  lost  their  dear  ones 
put  up  stones  to  their  memory,  inscribed  "  Jesu,  mercy !  " 


S.  SAVIOUR'S,  LEEDS 


283 


"  Lord,  remember  me  !  "    "  Of  your  charity  pray  for  the  soul 
of,"  etc.,  and  the  Bishop  uttered  his  indignant  protest. 
Troubles  began  anew  in  1850. 

In  the  January  of  that  year,  the  schoolmistress  and  her 
assistant  joined  the  Church  of  Rome,  their  reason  being  the 
want  of  fixity  of  teaching  in  the  English  Church  and  the  per- 
sistent and  systematic  persecution  exercised  on  all  those  who 
taught  the  Faith. 

The  Bishop  was  very  angry,  and  wrote  cruel  letters  on  the 
subject  to  Mr.  Minster.  He  also  ordered  the  taking  down  of 
a  plain  wooden  cross  that  was  on  the  screen,  and  the  discon- 
tinuance of  the  recitation  of  the  Morning  and  Evening  Prayers 
from  a  returned  stall  in  the  chancel. 

The  Vicar  answered  Dr.  Longley  on  the  matter  of  the  seces- 
sion of  the  schoolmistress :  "I  am  sorry  that  your  Lordship 
should  still  attribute  to  S.  Saviour's,  and  to  the  system  carried 
on  there,  those  effects  which  have  arisen  from  another  cause, 
even  on  the  confession  of  the  persons  themselves  implicated. 
On  the  contrary,  they  themselves  assured  me  that  had  they  not 
been  at  S.  Saviour's,  they  should,  years  since,  have  left  the 
Church  of  England,  and  that  I  alone  had  held  them  back  so 
long." 

In  the  spring  of  1850  came  the  Gorham  Judgment,  shaking 
men's  convictions  as  to  the  orthodoxy  of  the  English  Church. 
And  directly  after  appeared  a  published  letter  from  Dr.  Hook, 
containing  severe  allusions  to  S.  Saviour's.  Not  a  Sunday  nor 
a  Festival  passed  without  spies  being  sent  to  take  notes  of 
what  was  done  and  preached  in  the  Church,  and  these  were 
sent  to  Dr.  Hook,  and  through  him  to  the  Bishop,  without  any 
opportunity  being  offered  to  the  clergy  to  explain  and  state 
that  what  had  been  reported  was  a  garbled  version  of  what  had 
been  done  or  said.  Not  a  complaint  came  from  any  parishioner. 
Those  who  were  religious  were  heart  and  soul  with  the  clergy. 

At  the  Dedication  this  year,  1850,  Mr.  Ward,  the  first  vicar 
of  S.  Saviour's,  preached  to  his  old  parishioners.  The  sermon 
was  published,  whereupon  Bagot,  Bishop  of  Bath  and  Wells, 
his  diocesan,  suspended  him  from  work  in  his  diocese,  and  the 
Bishop  of  Ripon  inhibited  him  from  preaching  in  the  diocese 
as  well. 

Mr.  Pollen  preached  on  "  The  unity  of  the  Faith,"  whereupon 
Bishop  Longley  thought  proper  to  complain  to  the  Bishop  of 
Oxford.    The  passage  complained  of  was :    "  This  island  was 


284 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


called  the  Island  of  the  Saints  (in  reference  to  the  Ancient 
British  Church) ;  then  bishops  and  priests,  monks  and  hermits 
went  forth  from  our  shores  and  carried  the  Faith,"  etc.  It 
was  a  statement  of  fact  that  the  great  missions  throughout 
Germany,  Switzerland,  and  Gaul  had  been  the  work  of  Irish  and 
British  missionaries.  But  as  far  as  I  can  j  udge  because  of  the 
reference  to  monks  and  hermits,  as  casting  a  slight  on  the 
Reformation,  he  also  was  inhibited  by  the  Bishop  of  Oxford 
from  further  duty  in  the  diocese. 

And  now  the  clouds  grew  darker.  The  storm  arose  and 
burst  over  S.  Saviour's,  to  leave  her  little  better  than  a  stranded 
wreck. 

On  December  2,  1850,  the  clergy  of  S.  Saviour's  were  sum- 
moned to  appear  at  Ripon  before  the  Bishop  at  twenty-four 
hours'  notice,  to  answer  charges  with  respect  to  the  doctrines 
and  practices  prevalent  at  S.  Saviour's,  not  knowing  what  was 
coming,  what  the  charges  were.  In  their  simple  souls,  they 
went  as  to  a  Father  in  God  and  expected  paternal  treatment. 
They  found  the  Bishop  in  his  palace,  provided  with  both  legal 
adviser  and  secretary  to  take  down  depositions.  They  were 
introduced  into  the  library,  and  there  the  proceedings  seem  to 
have  been  most  unfairly  conducted.  The  officials  were  allowed, 
and  encouraged  by  the  Bishop,  to  interpose  with  repeated 
remarks,  and  to  put  leading  questions  ;  and  the  office  of  judge 
was  merged  in  that  of  the  prosecutor. 

This  Commission  was  made  up,  beside  the  lawyers,  of  certain 
Low  Church  clergy  of  Leeds  who  had  stirred  up  mob  agitation 
against  S.  Saviour's,  with  Dr.  Hook  at  their  head,  and  the 
Bishop  in  the  chair.  The  accusers  had  got  together  six  or 
seven  witnesses,  among  them  two  pupil-teachers  who  had 
been  dismissed  for  their  immoral  conduct,  and  two  women  of 
infamous  character  whom  Mr.  Beckett  had  laboured  to  reclaim. 
The  object  of  the  accusers  was  to  make  out  a  charge  of  gross 
questionings  in  the  Confessional.  As  the  trial  proceeded,  cross- 
examination  by  Mr.  Minster  revealed  plainly  the  true  character 
of  the  accusing  "  witnesses,"  and  convicted  them  of  false- 
hood. Some  withdrew  in  confusion,  others  were  withdrawn  for 
their  own  sakes.  The  Bishop's  lawyer  expressed  himself  as 
feeling  that  there  was  no  evidence  to  justify  the  accusations 
brought  against  the  clergy.  Nevertheless  the  Low  Church 
clergyman  who  had  produced  these  scandalous  and  unsub- 
stantiated charges  was  allowed  to  leave  the  court  without  a 


S.  SAVIOUR'S,  LEEDS 


285 


word  of  reprimand  from  his  diocesan.  The  inquiry  was  again 
pursued  by  the  Bishop  on  December  14  and  15,  in  the  vestry 
of  the  parish  church  of  Leeds.  The  facts  elicited  were  that 
the  clergy  inculcated  the  duty  of  Confession  before  the  reception 
of  the  Holy  Communion  ;  that  they  taught  that  in  Absolution 
was  given  pardon  for  mortal  sins  ;  and  that  sin  after  baptism 
must  end  in  spiritual  death,  unless  resort  was  had  to  Sacramental 
Confession  as  the  remedy  appointed  by  the  Church  for  the 
restoration  of  the  transgressor  ;  that  after  Consecration  the 
elements  in  Holy  Communion  were  no  more  mere  bread  and 
wine. 

It  is  well  to  bear  in  mind  that  the  S.  Saviour's  people  were 
thoroughly  satisfied  with  their  clergy.  They  clung  to  them 
with  love,  they  placed  implicit  confidence  in  them,  and  not  a 
word  of  complaint  came  from  them.  The  complainers  were 
outsiders.  There  were  especially  three  or  four  Leeds  clergy, 
men  conspicuous  for  their  idleness  and  inefficiency  in  their 
parishes,  who  were  the  fuglemen  in  the  assault  against  S. 
Saviour's. 

The  main  inquiry  before  the  Bishop  had  been  into  the  prac- 
tice of  Confession  ;  and  although  the  charges  of  improper 
questioning  had  been  entirely  disproved,  the  Bishop  inhibited 
Messrs.  Beckett  and  Rooke,  and  Crawley,  another  curate,  in 
January  1851.  Mr.  Beckett's  inhibition,  however,  on  a  tech- 
nical objection,  was  afterwards  quashed.  Just  two  years  before, 
the  Bishop  had  sanctioned  Confession  provided  it  preceded 
Communion ;  and,  forgetting  this,  he  punished  the  curates  for 
doing  what  he  himself  had  authorized,  for  they  were,  at  the 
time,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  preparing  people  for  their  first 
Communion. 

Mr.  Minster  was  ill,  and  could  do  little  single-handed.  The 
people  drew  up  an  address  of  condolence  to  the  Vicar.  They 
had  been  so  coldly,  so  unsympathizingly  met  by  the  Bishop 
before,  that  they  did  not  venture  to  address  his  Lordship. 

It  was  a  touching  letter,  sad  yet  calm,  and  breathing  nothing 
but  affection  for  their  clergy,  and  absolute  confidence  in  them. 
A  feeling  of  deep  sorrow  seemed  to  pervade  it,  despair  at  the 
thought  of  losing  one  whom  they  had  so  loved  and  revered, 
combined  with  a  fear  of  having  taken  from  them  those  privileges 
which  they  valued. 

The  address  was  signed  by  660  of  the  congregation,  of  whom 
250  were  communicants.    It  was  forwarded  to  the  Bishop,  but 


286 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


as  it  was  addressed  to  their  Vicar,  he  loftily  put  it  aside  and 
took  no  notice  of  it. 

The  Vicar  being  ill  of  his  incurable  internal  malady,  and 
deprived  of  his  curates,  was  forced  to  notify  his  resignation  to 
his  Lordship,  and  thus  S.  Saviour's  was  again  without  clergy 
to  serve  at  her  altar.  The  Bishop  had  paralyzed  the  whole 
spiritual  life  of  the  parish. 

And  now  comes  the  saddest  episode  in  the  story.  In  the 
following  April,  Mr.  Ward,  the  first  vicar,  inhibited  by  his 
Bishop  and  shaken  in  his  confidence  in  the  English  Church 
through  the  Gorham  Judgment,  was,  together  with  Mr.  Crawley, 
received  into  the  Roman  Communion  at  Oscott,  near  Birmingham. 

It  was  not  the  S.  Saviour's  system  that  sent  them  over  to 
Rome.  They  had  been  absolutely  loyal  in  heart  to  the  English 
Church,  but  the  cruel,  unfatherly  conduct  of  their  Bishop,  and 
the  vagaries  of  the  Privy  Council,  had  demolished  their  confidence 
in  the  Church  of  England. 

The  week  following  they  came  to  Leeds,  with  Dr.  Newman, 
and  at  S.  Anne's  Roman  Catholic  Church  was  witnessed  the 
reception  of  several  persons  connected  with  S.  Saviour's. 

These  were  the  Rev.  M.  Lewthwaite  of  Clifford,  the  Rev. 
Mr.  Combes,  curate  of  S.  Saviour's,  the  almoner,  a  chorister,  the 
matron,  assistant  matron,  some  children  of  the  Orphanage, 
and  half  a  dozen  of  the  congregation,  male  and  female.  The 
Vicar  and  the  Rev.  S.  Rooke  were  received  privately.  When 
in  1 851  the  Rev.  J.  H.  Pollen  wrote  his  Recollections  of  Five 
Years  at  S.  Saviour's,  Leeds,  he  had  no  thought  of  joining  the 
Roman  Communion,  but  episcopal  bullying  at  length  drove 
him  also  over  the  border.  It  was  not  given  to  all  to  say  and 
act  with  Dr.  Pusey:  "  If  the  labours  of  years  will  not  persuade 
men  that  we  are  faithful  to  the  Church  of  England,  words  will 
not.  .  .  .  But  death  in  her  bosom  will." 

Thus,  within  the  short  space  of  six  years  from  the  opening  of 
the  church,  it  had  collapsed  as  a  manifestation  of  the  Church 
movement.  Bishop  Longley  was  rewarded  for  the  wreckage 
he  had  wrought.  Shortly  afterwards  he  was  promoted  to  the 
Bishopric  of  Durham  (1856),  thence  to  the  Archbishopric  of 
York,  and  further  to  that  of  Canterbury. 

He  bore  thenceforth  the  character  of  an  urbane  and  suave 
prelate,  and  I  am  not  aware  of  any  further  mischief  done  by 
him,  but  the  steps  to  his  promotion  were  on  the  hearts  of  earnest 
men  who  would  have  spent  their  lives  for  the  Church  of  Eng- 


S.  SAVIOUR  S,  LEEDS 


287 


land,  but  out  of  which  he  had  trodden  faith,  zeal,  and  confidence 
in  her. 

u  How  long,  O  Lord,  holy  and  true,  dost  Thou  not  judge 
and  avenge  our  blood  on  them  that  dwell  in  the  earth  ?  "  might 
the  suffering,  the  spurned,  the  maligned  Churchmen  cry  out, 
in  supplication  against  the  prelates,  State-appointed,  for  their 
blindness  to  the  needs  of  the  Church.  If  these  had  acted 
with  greater  gentleness  and  forbearance  much  might  have  been 
effected.  The  incessant  "  badgering "  to  which  the  clergy 
were  subjected  drove  them  into  extremes,  and  they  did  un- 
warrantable things  and  taught  much  that  was  indefensible. 
They  felt  themselves  isolated,  regarded  as  spiritual  lepers,  to 
be  avoided  ;  no  helping  hand  was  held  out  to  them,  no  sym- 
pathy was  shown  to  them  by  those  of  their  own  cloth.  Like  a 
horse  that  for  a  slight  trip  is  thrashed  and  thrashed,  not  with 
the  lash  only  but  with  the  butt  end  of  the  scourge,  they  were 
taken  with  madness,  and  flung  ahead,  regardless  whither  they 
went,  if  only  they  could  escape  the  blows  that  stung  them. 

No  thought  of  disloyalty  for  long  entered  the  heads  of  these 
clergy :  the  very  fulness  with  which  they  taught  the  power  of 
the  Keys,  and  the  Real  Presence,  showed  that  they  believed 
thoroughly  in  their  Orders  and  the  validity  of  the  sacraments 
they  administered. 

Out  of  the  fifteen  clergy  who  had  been  connected  with 
S.  Saviour's  since  its  consecration  in  1845,  nine  had  seceded. 

Immediately  after  this  terrible  collapse,  Dr.  Pusey  arrived, 
in  company  with  the  Rev.  C.  Marriott,  to  see  what  could  be 
done.  All  the  clergy  had  deserted  their  posts  except  Mr. 
Beckett,  the  senior  curate  ;  among  the  faithless,  faithful  only 
he,  to  fight  for  the  Church  of  which  he  was  put  in  charge.  He 
went  calmly  on  his  way,  working  for  his  people  with  grave 
resolution.  I  met  him,  and  felt  awe  and  reverence  for  him 
almost  unsurpassed.  All  the  reward  he  had  for  his  steadfast- 
ness was  a  prompt  suspension  from  the  Bishop.  He  went  out  to 
South  Africa,  where  he  founded  a  small  brotherhood  under  Bishop 
Twells.    He  lived  mostly  in  a  cave,  and  there  he  died. 

Some  of  the  seceding  clergy  and  laymen  took  up  their  residence 
at  a  house  five  minutes'  walk  from  the  church.  A  Roman  priest 
came  to  live  with  them,  and  they  tried  by  argument,  cajolery, 
and  in  some  cases  by  bribery,  to  make  as  many  converts  as 
possible.  But,  perhaps  to  their  surprise,  certainly  to  their 
disappointment,  their  efforts  were  unavailing.    Mr.  Beckett's 


288 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


influence  kept  back  the  greater  number  of  those  who  were 
tempted  to  follow  their  late  teachers.  Only  two  entire  families 
seceded,  and  a  few  stragglers. 

On  Palm  Sunday  of  this  memorable  year,  April  13,  Dr.  Pusey 
was  announced  to  preach  on  the  great  collapse  that  had  taken 
place  ;  but  just  before  the  sermon  he  was  so  overcome  by 
emotion  that  he  fainted  in  the  church,  and  had  to  be  carried 
into  the  sacristy,  whereupon  Mr.  Marriott  ascended  the  pulpit 
and  preached. 

It  was  a  memorable  occasion,  and  every  one  was  looking 
forward,  and  wondering  what  was  to  be  the  future  of  that  un- 
happy church,  so  relentlessly  and  so  ruthlessly  persecuted  from 
without,  and  so  enfeebled  within.  The  Vicarage  was  offered  to  : 
the  Rev.  J.  W.  Knott,  Fellow  of  Brasenose,  and  tutor  of  Shore- 
ham  College.  He  was  a  man  of  a  peculiar  temperament,  earnest, 
devout,  but  one  who  had  never  assimilated  Catholic  doctrine, 
and  when  at  S.  Saviour's  he  was  restless  and  ever  wanting  to 
get  away,  for  at  heart  he  was  imbued  with  the  Wesleyan  doc- 
trine of  Instantaneous  Conversion.  In  laying  hold  of  this  he 
was  largely  influenced  by  the  Rev.  R.  Aitken,  of  Cornwall,  who 
jumbled  up  in  a  remarkable  manner  a  certain  amount  of  High 
Churchism  with  Wesleyanism.  Prayer-meetings  and  revivals 
were  now  in  vogue  under  Mr.  Knott,  till  he  found  that  his  posi- 
tion was  untenable,  and  he  left,  to  become  eventually  a  mission- 
ary under  the  C.M.S.,  and  died  in  India.  I  met  him  when  I 
was  in  Yorkshire,  and  he  struck  me  as  an  unhappy  man,  ill-at- 
ease  with  himself  and  with  those  with  whom  he  was  brought 
into  contact,  one  into  whose  soul  the  sunshine  had  never  entered, 
and  whose  brain  was  somewhat  unbalanced. 

He  left  in  1859,  and  was  succeeded  by  the  Rev.  Richard 
Collins,  when  the  Eucharistic  vestments  were  introduced.  Collins 
was  an  inert  individual,  casual  and  somewhat  slovenly,  and 
during  his  tenure  of  S.  Saviour's  everything  went  dead.  But 
perhaps  it  was  as  well  for  the  parish,  after  the  excitement  it  had 
gone  through,  that  a  period  of  repose  should  succeed. 

Collins  was  not  in  good  health,  and  he  died  suddenly  at  the 
Church  Institute  in  1877,  of  heart  disease.  He  was  succeeded 
by  the  Rev.  J.  Wylde,  who  is  still  vicar,  and  now  S.  Saviour's  is 
the  centre  of  vigorous  and  flourishing  church  life.  There  have 
been  no  more  debacles. 

Some  lines  were  circulated  by  Mr.  Chatterton  Dix,  a  parody 
on  Little  Bo-Peep,  applicable  here : 


S.  SAVIOUR'S,  LEEDS 


289 


Bishops,  asleep,  once  lost  their  sheep 

And  could  not  tell  where  to  find  them  ; 
Some  few  went  to  Rome,  the  rest  stopped  at  home, 

With  the  P.W.R.1  behind  them. 

Bishops,  asleep,  dreamt  of  their  sheep 

And  thought  they  heard  them  bleating  ; 
When  they  awoke,  the  silly  sheep  spoke, 

And  the  shepherds  gave  them  a  beating. 

Looking  back  upon  the  tragic  history  of  S.  Saviour's,  one 
can  feel  the  appropriateness  of  the  words  of  Newman  as  ad- 
dressed to  the  English  Church  :  "  0  my  mother,  whence  is  this 
unto  thee,  to  be  strange  to  thine  own  flesh,  and  thine  eye  cruel 
towards  thy  little  ones  ?  Thine  own  offspring,  the  fruit  of  thy 
womb,  who  love  thee  and  would  toil  for  thee,  thou  dost  gaze 
upon  with  fear,  as  though  a  portent,  or  thou  dost  loathe  as  an 
offence — at  best,  thou  dost  but  endure,  as  if  they  had  no  claims, 
but  on  thy  patience,  self-possession,  and  vigilance,  to  be  rid 
of  them  as  easily  as  thou  mayest.  Thou  makest  them  '  stand 
all  the  day  idle  '  as  the  very  condition  of  thy  bearing  with 
them,  or  thou  biddest  them  begone  where  they  will  be  more 
welcome,  or  thou  sellest  them  for  naught  to  the  stranger  that 
passes  by." 

1  Public  Worship  Regulation  Act. 


19 


CHAPTER  XII 


S.  JUDE'S,  BRADFORD 

IN  sharp  contrast  to  the  tragic  story  of  S.  Saviour's,  Leeds, 
I  will  give  that  of  S.  Jude's,  Bradford,  which  encoun- 
tered none  of  those  disasters  that  befell  the  other  churcl 
Harassed  and  interfered  with  it  was,  but  it  never  broke  do^ 
through  the  desertion  of  its  pastors  for  another  communion.  The 
story  is  instructive,  for  it  is  that  of  a  thousand  other  churches 
throughout  the  land.  I  give  it  as  a  sample  of  what  has  been 
going  on  elsewhere  ;  moreover  it  shows  what  S.  Saviour's  did 
not  show  —  a  solidity  and  caution  in  advance,  and  patience, 
which  were  lacking  in  the  clergy  of  the  Leeds  church.  If  all 
God's  waves  and  storms  went  over  this  latter,  S.  Jude's  rode 
quieter  waters,  and  though  buffeted  never  had  her  decks  swept 
nor  sprung  a  leak. 

The  town  of  Bradford  in  the  early  half  of  the  last  centu) 
presented  a  dreary  aspect  both  materially  and  spiritually, 
dense  cloud  of  smoke,  issuing  from  its  numerous  and  constantly 
increasing  factories,  hid  the  sun  from  the  eye  ;  a  toiling  multitude 
ever  growing,  taxed  the  energies  of  the  Church  to  prevent  i1 
falling  into  heathenism.  In  i860,  although  several  districts  hi 
been  cut  off  and  provided  with  churches  and  schools,  the  Parisl 
Church  of  S.  Peter  was  left  with  a  population  of  something  lil 
30,000  souls  who  were  under  the  nominal  care  of  the  Vicar  anc 
four  curates.  The  living  was  held  by  the  Rev.  Dr.  Burnet, 
able  preacher,  kind-hearted  and  genial  in  manner,  but  lackii 
in  moral  firmness.  He  had  risen  considerably  above  the  the( 
logical  standard  of  the  patrons,  the  Simeonite  Trustees,  incurring 
thereby  their  marked  displeasure.  He  posed  as  a  moderat 
High  Churchman  who  would  gladly  have  followed  in  the  ste] 
of  his  neighbour,  Dr.  Hook,  the  Vicar  of  Leeds,  could  he  ha^ 
done  so  without  provoking  opposition. 

About  i860,  a  number  of  devoted,  earnest  laymen,  wor- 
shippers at  the  parish  church,  struck  with  the  inadequacy  of  the 
existing  parochial  machinery,  formed  themselves  into  a  society, 
the  members  of  which  were  pledged  to  undertake  some  definite 

290 


S.  JUDE'S,  BRADFORD 


291 


religious  work,  and  to  unite  in  prayer,  intercession,  and  Holy 
Communion.  It  adopted  the  harmless  title  of  the  S.  Peter's 
Union  for  Church  Work.  The  vicar  became  its  president, 
approved  its  rules,  and  appointed  one  of  his  curates  to  be  its 
chaplain.  The  works  to  which  the  Union  devoted  itself  were 
teaching  in  the  Sunday  and  night  schools,  visiting  the  whole  and 
sick  in  their  homes,  and  distributing  Church  literature,  collect- 
ing funds  in  support  of  home  and  foreign  missions,  and  arrang- 
ing periodical  meetings  in  their  aid,  managing  Savings  Banks 
and  provident  societies  ;  in  fact,  all  the  ordinary  machinery  of 
a  we  11- worked  parish.  In  addition  to  the  members  (who  were 
communicants)  there  were  associates,  who  were  mostly  young 
men  and  women  too  old  for  the  usual  Sunday  school  class. 
For  their  benefit  a  monthly  meeting  was  held,  when  instruction 
on  Church  doctrine  was  given  by  one  of  the  curates. 

After  four  years  this  organization  was  arbitrarily  dissolved 
by  the  Vicar  on  the  ground  that  its  members  had  indulged  in 
"  practices,  tendencies,  and  an  appetite  for  ritualism."  He 
steadfastly  refused,  although  respectfully  requested  to  do  so, 
to  specify  what  these  practices  were,  or  to  name  the  persons 
who  yielded  to  this  appetite  (an  appetite,  by  the  by,  which  could 
never  be  gratified  without  the  concurrence  of  the  clergy).  He 
was  asked  to  investigate  the  proceedings  of  the  Union,  the 
members  pledging  themselves  to  abide  by  his  decision  and  to 
modify  all  that  he  objected  to.  But  to  no  purpose.  The  fact 
was  that  the  prejudices  of  Orangemen  and  rabid  Protestants 
were  stirred  up  by  the  distinctness  and  thoroughness  of  the 
work,  and  so  the  Vicar,  in  a  moment  of  weakness,  thought  to 
conciliate  them  by  casting  his  loyal  fellow  workers  out  of  the 
boat.  Some  fifty  or  sixty  Churchmen  and  Churchwomen  were 
by  this  piece  of  folly  dismissed  from  their  posts  as  teachers  and 
visitors,  the  weekly  early  celebration  was  for  a  time  abandoned, 
and  the  chaplain's  services  as  one  of  the  staff  of  curates  dis- 
pensed with.  An  appeal  of  this  last  to  the  Bishop  (Bickersteth) 
produced  no  result  beyond  the  expression  of  opinion  that  the 
charges  brought  against  him  and  his  fellow  workers  were 
frivolous  in  the  extreme,  but  that  for  the  sake  of  peace  it  would 
be  better  for  him  to  resign.  A  licence  to  another  curacy  in  the 
diocese  was  granted,  coupled,  however,  with  the  intimation  that 
he  must  never  expect  preferment  at  the  Bishop's  hands.  "  Soli- 
tudinem  faciunt,  pacem  appellant,"  but  in  this  case  the  victory 
proved  a  barren  one.    For  the  district  church  of  S.  Jude  was  at 


292 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


this  time  in  sore  need  of  help.  It  had  been  built  about  twenty 
years  before,  to  serve  a  large  and  mixed  population  consisting 
of  dwellers  on  the  outskirts  of  the  town,  and  also  of  factory 
hands  and  other  operatives  living  in  the  adjoining  narrow 
streets  and  courts.  For  a  time  the  excellence  of  the  music 
attracted  congregations,  but  after  a  while  these  fell  off,  and  the 
reign  of  deadness  seemed  to  have  set  in.  The  first  incumbent 
exchanged  with  the  Rev.  John  Eddowes,  who  set  himself  to  the 
task  of  reviving  the  work.  The  first  need,  in  his  opinion,  was 
to  make  all  sittings  perfectly  free.  There  were  at  the  time  no 
less  than  seventeen  different  rates  paid  for  pews,  according  to 
their  position  and  eligibility.  After  a  considerable  amount  of 
opposition  he  carried  his  point,  and  also  substituted  the  weekly 
offertory  for  pew  rents.  Daily  prayers  and  weekly  celebrations 
were  started  at  the  same  time. 

Then  it  was  that  the  members  of  the  S.  Peter's  Union,  ex- 
pelled from  their  own  parish,  felt  themselves  free  to  offer  their 
services  to  the  Vicar  of  S.  Jude's.  Needless  to  say,  the  offer 
was  gratefully  accepted.  New  life  was  infused.  A  second 
Evensong  at  eight  on  Sundays  was  provided,  at  which  the 
Church's  Plain  Song  was  used.  After  a  time,  when  appropria- 
tion of  seats  was  finally  abolished,  this  was  dropped  as  no  longer 
necessary.  A  Guild  was  established  ;  attendance  at  the  day 
and  Sunday  schools  was  increased  ;  above  all,  the  number  of 
communicants  grew  year  by  year.  Various  structural  alterations 
were  made  in  the  church :  a  new  vestry  was  built ;  a  new  altar 
was  raised,  with  the  proper  ornaments ;  a  massive  brass  cross,  the 
gift  of  the  Guild  of  S.  Alban,  took  the  place  of  the  plain  wooden 
one  formerly  in  use.  These  were  material  improvements,  but 
there  were  also  signs  of  more  important  progress — that  of  a 
spiritual  character.  Missions  were  held  which  had  the  effect 
of  stirring  up  spiritual  life.  The  first  was  conducted  by  Canon 
Body  in  1872  ;  in  1876,  S.  Jude's  took  part  in  the  general 
Bradford  Mission,  when  Canon  Body  again  conducted. 

With  regard  to  the  former  of  these,  the  following  words,  written 
by  one  who  was  an  active  worker  at  S.  Jude's,  will  prove  interest- 
ing :  "  Some  who  read  these  lines  will  recall  with  thankfulness 
silent  moments  of  earnest  prayer  in  church,  and  perhaps  also 
a  few  minutes  spent  in  faithful  converse  with  the  missioner, 
leaving  an  impress  on  all  their  after-life.  The  crowd,  too,  of 
men  standing  wherever  they  could  find  standing-room  at  the 
special  services  for  men  on  the  Sunday  afternoon  (such  services 


S.  JUDE'S,  BRADFORD 


293 


being  far  less  common  than  they  are  now)  was  a  sight  too  im- 
pressive to  be  easily  forgotten.    But  the  most  marked  effect 
of  that  mission,  and  that  not  the  least  blessed,  was  probably 
the  clearing  away  of  much  prejudice.    A  mountain  of  suspicion 
— suspicion  of  lurking  Popery — was  rolled  away,  and  thus  one 
hindrance  to  God's  work  in  the  parish  was  greatly  lessened. 
As  an  expression  of  the  gratitude  of  the  people  to  the  missioner, 
a  service  of  altar  plate,  in  silver  gilt,  for  the  church  at  Kirkby 
Misperton,  was  presented  to  Mr.  Body.    The  oaken  box  en- 
closing it  bore  the  following  inscription  :   "  For  the  service  of 
the  altar  in  the  parish  of  Kirkby  Misperton,  a  thankoffering  from 
the  worshippers  at  S.  Jude's,  Bradford,  for  much  blessing  received, 
through  the  ministry  of  the  Rev.  George  Body,  Easter  1872."  1 
The  Rev.  A.  H.  Mackonochie  had  preached  and  held  services 
with  a  view  to  a  mission  as  early  as  1869,  but  his  intention  to 
hold  one  was  frustrated  by  the  Bishop  of  Ripon  inhibiting 
him  from  officiating  in  the  diocese.    This,  by  the  way,  proved  a 
blunder  on  the  part  of  the  an ti- Ritualists,  for  it  aroused  popular 
sympathy  with  the  persecuted  Vicar  of  S.  Alban's,  Holborn ;  the 
congregation  of  S.  Jude's  showing  theirs  in  a  practical  way  by 
collecting  £24  towards  the  Mackonochie  Defence  Fund  J  on  the 
Sunday  after  the  inhibition  had  been  served.  Other  missions  were 
from  time  to  time  held,  the  results  of  which  were  increased  atten- 
dance at  the  altar,  and  resort  to  Confession,  as  well  as  deepened 
spiritual  life  of  very  many.    The  following  statistics  supplied 
by  the  work  already  mentioned,  and  for  which,  as  well  as  for 
other  information,  we  are  greatly  indebted  to  the  author,  show 
how  marked  was  the  material  growth  of  the  parish  at  this  time : 


Numbers  of  Communicants  at  the  Greater  Festivals 


Year. 

Easter  Day. 

Whit-Sunday. 

Christmas  Day. 

18582 

27 

17 

13 

1863 

75 

47 

26 

1868 

288 

176 

131 

1872  3 

306 

155 

173 

1876  4 

436 

228 

261 

1883 

475 

297 

335 

1888 

441 

189 

290 

1893 

488 

183 

1  Fifty  Years  at  St.  Jude's,  Bradford,  pp.  29,  30. 

2  The  first  year  of  Rev.  J.  Eddowes's  incumbency. 

3  The  first  mission  by  Canon  Body  held  this  year. 

4  The  General  Bradford  Mission  held  this  year. 


294 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


WEEKLY  OFFERTORIES 


Year 
1862 
1867 
1872 
1877 


I  s.  d.  Year 

257  o  8  1884 

517  2  9  1889 

819  4  9  1892 

968  3  6 


I      s.  d 

95i    3  7 

653  18  9 

790  14  1 


In  1875  and  1876,  when  special  appeals  were  made  for  the  build- 
ing of  new  vestries,  the  amounts  were  £1,155  17s-  ndL  and 
£1,136  195.  3d. 

The  introduction  of  a  branch  of  the  All  Saints'  Sisterhood  in 
1873  was  attended  with  the  happiest  results.  The  work  of  the 
Sisters  lay  chiefly  among  the  poorer  classes,  but  those  above 
them  were  not  neglected.  The  sick  were  visited  and  their 
wants  relieved,  the  children  taught,  and  adults  instructed. 
Ragged  schools  were  carried  on,  the  Guilds  multiplied  so  as  to 
include  all  classes  and  ages,  and  a  middle-class  school,  for  the 
daughters  of  professional  men,  supplied  a  great  need.  One 
house  was  sufficient  at  first  to  hold  the  Sisters  and  provide 
room  for  such  good  works  as  could  be  managed  indoors.  It 
soon  became  necessary,  however,  to  look  out  for  larger  quarters, 
and  three  adjoining  houses  were  taken  and  thrown  into  one, 
into  which  the  Sisters  removed.  The  daily  Celebration  now 
became  possible,  for  the  clerical  staff  was  increased.  A  retreat 
for  ladies  was  held  annually  by  Canon  Body  ;  in  1877  a  parochial 
retreat  was  conducted  by  Father  Simeon. 

In  the  course  of  years  the  work  developed  in  another  direc- 
tion. The  spiritual  needs  of  the  poorer  part  of  the  parish  had 
long  been  a  source  of  anxiety  to  the  Vicar  ;  their  relief  formed 
a  problem  which  for  some  years  he  was  unable  to  solve.  But  in 
1871  some  cottages  were  acquired  by  him,  and,  by  being  thrown 
into  one,  made  a  mission  room  capable  of  holding  100  persons. 
The  Rev.  G.  E.  Redhead  was  put  in  charge  of  this  mission, 
which  was  ultimately  cut  off  from  the  Mother  Church  and 
became  the  parish  of  S.  Mary  Magdalene.  The  permanent 
church  was  consecrated  in  1878,  after  endless  difficulties  had  been 
surmounted.  It  was  a  memorial  to  a  devout  layman,  Mr. 
W.  W.  Harris,  one  of  a  well-known  Bradford  family,  who  entered 
into  rest  in  1875.  Some  months  elapsed  before  the  priest  in 
charge  was  instituted  to  the  incumbency,  the  delay  being 
caused  by  the  Archdeacon  (Bishop  Ryan) 1  objecting  to  the 

1  Ryan  was  a  "  returned  empty."  He  had  been  consecrated  to  Mauritius 
in  1855  and  gave  it  up  in  1867.    During  the  time  he  held  the  see,  he  was 


S.  JUDE'S,  BRADFORD 


295 


reredos,  an  objection  which  was  overruled  on  appeal  by  the 
Chancellor  of  the  diocese.  Mr.  Redhead  continued  his  work 
at  S.  Mary  Magdalene's  for  more  than  twenty-five  years,  refus- 
ing all  offers  of  preferment  and  only  resigning  when  obliged  to 
do  so  by  ill-health  in  1905.  The  Vicar  of  S.  Jude's,  Mr.  Eddowes, 
was  obliged  by  the  same  cause  to  accept  a  less  arduous  post 
in  1886.  He  was  succeeded  by  the  Rev.  Edward  Brice.  His 
health,  too,  broke  down  in  1893.  His  death,  after  seven  years' 
ministry,  took  place  in  the  autumn  of  1893.  He  was  succeeded, 
to  the  great  joy  of  the  parishioners,  by  the  old  vicar,  Canon 
Eddowes,  who  returned  to  the  scene  of  his  early  labours  and 
retained  the  living  until  his  death  in  1905,  after  having  held 
it  first  and  last  for  all  but  fifty  years.  It  will  have  been  noticed 
that  such  a  long  and  faithful  ministry  received  towards  its 
close  a  slight  recognition  on  the  part  of  the  diocesan,  for  he 
was  made  an  honorary  canon  of  the  Cathedral,  a  tardy  tribute 
to  Mr.  Eddowes's  worth  and  self-denying  labours. 

It  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  all  this  work  was  carried  on 
without  opposition.  There  was  the  dead  weight  of  the  respect- 
able Churchmanship  of  the  town  to  be  contended  with ;  a 
vast  mass  of  unreasoning  prejudice  to  be  encountered,  as  well 
as  the  virulent  attacks  of  the  Orangemen.  No  one  at  the 
present  day  can  have  any  idea  of  the  bitterness  of  feeling  which 
the  simple  ceremonial  of  S.  Jude's  stirred  up.  Things  which  are 
now  accepted  as  a  matter  of  course  everywhere  were  then 
regarded  as  badges  of  Popery  ;  those  who  taught  the  doctrine 
of  the  Prayer  Book  were  looked  upon  as  Jesuits  in  disguise. 
"  Popery  was  suspected  in  everything.  It  was  found  to  lurk 
even  amidst  the  flowers  in  the  Easter  decorations  ;  although, 
by  a  curious  inconsistency,  Christmas  decorations  were  deemed 
quite  innocent,  and  were  indeed  approved  of.  The  sign  or  figure 
of  the  Cross,  in  any  place  or  position,  gave  great  offence.  The 
reverent  bowing  of  the  head  at  the  Holy  Name  was  not  to  be 
tolerated."  1  Not  a  single  incumbent  in  the  town  ventured  to 
stand  by  the  clergy  of  S.  Jude's.  More  than  once  Mr.  Eddowes 
was  delated  to  the  Bishop,  and  only  by  making  a  firm  stand 
was  he  able  to  ward  off  episcopal  interference.  Sympathizers 
with  popular  Protestantism  were  elected  churchwardens  ;  these 

twice  back  in  England,  and  made  an  expedition  to  Madagascar,    He  was 
made  Vicar  of  Bradford  in  1870,  and  Archdeacon  of  Craven  in  1873.  A 
very  ultra  Evangelical. 
1  Fifty  Years  at  S.  Jude's,  p.  18. 


296 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


either  did  nothing  during  their  year  of  office,  or  else,  instead  of 
hindering  the  work,  became  its  most  active  supporters.  They 
took  the  independent  line  of  judging  for  themselves.  But  in 
spite  of  an  unsympathizing  bishop,  lukewarm,  if  not  hostile 
clergy,  ignorant  Puritan  opposition,  and  general  indifference  on 
the  part  of  the  public,  the  work  prospered.  Why  ?  Because, 
as  Mr.  Eddowes  said  in  his  sermon  on  the  fiftieth  anniversary 
of  the  Consecration,  God  was  with  them.  "  If  God  be  for  us, 
who  can  be  against  us  ?  "  And,  secondly,  because  priest  and 
people  worked  together.  The  priest  was  always  conscious  that 
he  had  at  his  back  earnest  Churchmen  who  fully  trusted  him 
and  supported  him  through  thick  and  thin.  And  this  is  the 
main  reason  why  S.  Jude's  has  had  a  chapter  devoted  to  it  in 
this  work ;  the  movement  there  was  so  essentially  one  of 
laymen.  It  shows  what  can  be  done  if  only  the  laity  are  taught 
and  then  trusted ;  and  we  may  be  sure,  if  we  read  the  signs  of 
the  times  aright,  this  must  be  the  policy  of  the  Church  in  the 
future — to  throw  itself  on  the  mass  of  the  people  for  support, 
not  so  much  pecuniary,  although  this  will  not  be  withheld,  as 
personal. 


CHAPTER  XIII 


AGITATION  AGAINST  CONFESSION 

IN  1858  occurred  what  at  the  time  was  known  as  the 
"Boyne  Hill  Case."  The  Rector  of  Boyne  Hill  was  the 
Rev.  W.  Gresley,  and  he  had  a  curate  named  Temple 
West.  In  the  neighbourhood  resided  an  Evangelical  clergy- 
man, the  Rev.  John  Shaw,  who  was  one  of  those  men  who 
listen  to  any  tittle-tattle,  especially  if  malicious,  and  believe  it 
without  investigation  as  to  its  truth.  He  heard  a  great  many 
stories  against  Mr.  West,  and  took  them  so  entirely  for  Gospel 
that  he  sent  an  account  of  them  as  facts  to  Bishop  Wilberforce, 
who,  as  was  his  invariable  custom,  passed  them  on  to  the  rector 
of  the  parish  for  explanation.  Mr.  Gresley  was  able  easily  to 
satisfy  Bishop  Wilberforce  that  the  complaints  made  against 
Mr.  West  were  untrue.  Mr.  Shaw's  next  proceeding  was  to 
send  the  correspondence  between  himself  and  the  Bishop  to 
the  Times.  That  journal,  as  credulous  as  Mr.  Shaw  had  shown 
himself  to  be,  led  off  an  attack  on  the  Bishop  upon  the  state- 
ment of  one  woman,  and  she  a  person  of  notoriously  bad  life, 
ignoring  the  absolute  contradiction  of  her  statements  made  by 
the  Rector  and  his  curate,  and  passing  over  in  silence  the  fact 
that  the  Bishop  of  the  diocese  had  promised  to  issue  a  Com- 
mission to  inquire  into  the  case.  Bishop  Wilberforce  wrote  in 
a  letter  :  "  The  Times  took  the  matter  up  as  if  I  had  stifled 
all  inquiry,  and  represented  me  as  shuffling  because  I  main- 
tained the  true  Church  of  England  doctrine  against  the  popular 
cry.  Upon  this  Punch  and  all  the  infidel  and  Low  Church  papers 
have  set  upon  me  with  full  venom." 

The  Bishop  issued  his  Commission,  consisting  of  the  Chancellor 
of  the  diocese,  two  clergymen,  and  two  laymen,  and  on  Sep- 
tember 28  they  delivered  their  judgment,  entirely  exculpating 
Mr.  West  from  all  the  charges  which  had  been  made  against  him. 

Shortly  after  this,  and  whilst  the  ferment  throughout  Eng- 
land was  in  full  boil,  the  Bishop  went  to  Bradford  to  speak  at 

297 


298 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


a  meeting  on  behalf  of  the  S.P.G.  Placards  were  posted  about 
the  streets  :  "  Men  and  women  of  Bradford  !  Come  in  your 
thousands  to  S.  George's  Hall,  and  in  a  voice  of  thunder  resist 
the  Tractarian  Confessionals."  Long  before  the  time  fixed  for 
the  meeting  the  hall  was  crowded  to  overflow ;  at  least  4,000 
persons  were  present.  The  Bishop,  on  rising  to  speak,  was 
greeted  with  hisses  and  hootings  and  some  cheers.  He  stood 
calm  in  his  dignity  and  began  :  "  Brother  Yorkshire  men  ! 
There  was  a  lull — and  then  he  spoke,  and  with  the  wondrous 
charm  of  his  manner,  his  absolute  sincerity,  and  his  eloquence, 
he  dominated  the  whole  concourse.  When  he  sat  down  the 
hisses  that  had  greeted  him  on  rising  were  replaced  by  thunderous 
cheers.    My  friend,  Canon  Fowler,  was  present  at  this  meeting. 

Even  the  Times  was  obliged  to  admit  :  "  There  is  no  human 
quality  that  English  people  honour  more  than  pluck,  whether 
in  a  soldier,  statesman,  fox-hunter,  or  bishop,  and  it  was  acting 
on  this  that  the  Bishop  of  Oxford  went  straight  from  the 
Boyne  Hill  inquiry  to  meet  a  Yorkshire  mob." 

The  reference  to  Punch  in  the  letter  of  the  Bishop  referred 
to  a  cartoon,  entitled  Dangerous  Flirtation,  that  appeared  on 
August  28,  1858,  and  to  some  lines,  too  long  to  be  quoted. 

In  the  year  i860  there  occurred  at  Road,  in  Somerset,  a  horrible 
murder  of  a  little  boy  aged  five,  on  the  night  of  June  29-30. 
He  had  been  taken  from  his  crib  and  from  the  house,  and  the 
body  was  found  in  the  garden.  Efforts  were  made  to  discover 
the  murderer,  but  in  vain.  It  was  obvious  that  the  guilty  per- 
son was  an  inmate  of  the  house,  and  general  suspicion  attached 
to  the  father,  who  was  supposed,  without  a  shadow  of  reason, 
to  have  had  an  intrigue  with  the  nurse,  and  it  was  thought 
that  the  child  was  made  away  with  lest  it  should  betray  awkward 
secrets.  The  little  fellow  was  buried,  and  on  the  tombstone  was 
cut  "  God  will  bring  to  light  the  hidden  things  of  darkness." 

Time  passed,  and  the  incident  was  falling  out  of  recollection, 
when  the  truth  was  brought  to  light  in  an  unexpected  manner. 
In  1865  the  public  was  startled  by  the  appearance  of  Constance 
Kent,  the  half-sister  of  the  murdered  child,  before  the  magistrate 
at  Bow  Street.  She  had  surrendered  herself  as  having  killed  her 
step-brother  out  of  jealousy  and  spite.  She  said  that  she  had 
been  to  Confession  to  Mr.  Wagner  of  S.  Paul's,  Brighton,  and 
that  he  had  told  her  that  she  was  morally  bound  to  surrender 
herself  to  justice,  and  so  clear  the  dark  cloud  of  suspicion  that 
hung  over  her  father's  head.    She  was  tried  the  same  year  at 


AGITATION  AGAINST  CONFESSION  299 


the  summer  assizes  at  Salisbury.  Mr.  Wagner  was  summoned, 
and  a  vain  attempt  was  made  to  induce  him  to  divulge  what 
had  been  confessed  to  him.  He  resolutely  refused  to  say  a 
word.  Constance  Kent  had  capital  sentence  passed  on  her, 
but  this  was  commuted  to  penal  servitude  for  life.  She  was 
released  on  ticket  of  leave,  July  18,  1885.  The  fact  that  the 
mystery  had  been  solved  through  the  Confessional  raised  a 
storm  of  indignation.  Mr.  Wagner  was  attacked  for  not  telling 
what  had  been  said  to  him  in  the  confidence  of  the  Confessional. 
He  was  abused  for  requiring  his  penitent  to  give  herself  up  to 
justice.  It  was  said  that  if  persons  did  that  sort  of  thing  no 
one  would  trust  to  them  any  secrets.  In  general  a  great  agita- 
tion was  provoked  against  the  practice  of  Confession. 

We  have  seen  that  this  was  not  the  first  outbreak  of  the 
agitation,  which  began  at  Plymouth  in  1852,  but  it  had  simmered 
on,  with  occasional  explosions  of  anger. 

In  the  latter  part  of  the  year  1873  ensued  one  of  the  periodical 
outbursts  of  English  prejudice  against  the  practice  of  Confes- 
sion.   On  this  occasion  it  was  unusually  prolonged. 

It  opened  with  a  memorial  on  the  subject  addressed  to  the 
Bishop  of  London  by  the  vestry  of  S.  George's,  Hanover  Square. 
To  this  his  Lordship  replied,  deprecating  the  practice,  and 
advising  laymen  not  to  send  their  children  to  schools,  however 
good  the  education,  where  Confession  was  practised. 

The  Bishop  and  the  majority  of  the  clergy  in  the  Victorian 
period  were  like  old-fashioned  country  doctors,  who  diagnosed 
every  disorder  by  a  look  at  the  tongue  and  a  finger  on  the 
pulse,  who  never  used  a  stethoscope  and  had  never  heard  of  the 
X-ray,  whose  only  remedies  consisted  in  James's  Powder  and 
Friar's  Balsam. 

I  have  known  surgeons  who  could  not  detect  a  disloca- 
tion, and  when  this  was  discovered  by  a  hospital  nurse,  or  a 
bone-setter,  the  doctors  have  been  lashed  to  fury. 

It  was  so  with  regard  to  broken  and  wounded  souls.  The  old 
spiritual  practitioners  meddled  and  muddled  and  did  nothing. 
And  when  priests  did  appear  on  the  scene,  experienced  in  the 
care  of  souls,  knowing  what  remedies  to  apply,  they  foamed 
with  rage  against  them. 

A  project  for  revising  the  Prayer  Book  being  then  in  hand,  a 
number  of  clergy,  403  in  all,  petitioned  Convocation  to  limit 
the  number  of  Confessors  by  issuing  licences  to  approved  and 
wise  priests,  who  alone  would  be  justified  to  direct  souls.    It  was 


300 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


thought  that  much  prejudice  would  be  overcome  if  penitents 
were  allowed  only  to  go  to  men  of  experience  and  age.  But  the 
proposal  worked  Lord  Shaftesbury  to  fury,  and  he  spoke  in  such 
outrageous  terms  that  even  the  admiring  Times  was  shocked 
at  the  paroxysms  of  rage  into  which  the  proposal  threw  him. 
"  What,"  asked  his  Lordship  in  a  meeting  at  Exeter  Hall,  "  have 
members  of  the  Church  of  England  to  do  with  rubrics  ?  "  He 
might  as  well  have  asked,  "  What  has  a  cricketer  to  do  with  the 
rules  of  the  game  ?  " 

At  S.  Alban's,  Holborn,  were  narrow  curtains  hung  against 
the  side  wall  to  screen  off  the  penitent  from  the  inquisitive 
gaze  of  persons  in  the  church.  It  was  a  distraction  to  the 
penitent  to  see  people  watching  and  commenting  on  the  pro- 
ceedings, but  the  Bishop  of  London  ordered  their  removal,  and 
his  order  was  obeyed.  It  was  obviously  advisable  that  Con- 
fession should  not  be  made  in  the  vestry,  but  in  the  church, 
and  yet  that  there  should  be  some  protection  to  the  penitent 
from  impertinent  gazers. 

In  the  mediaeval  English  Church,  Confessions  were  heard  in 
the  body  of  the  church,  without  any  curtains ;  in  Lent  a  chancel 
veil  hung  from  the  roof,  and  in  the  sight  of  everyone,  all  through 
Shrove-time  and  Lent,  confessions — of  women  especially — were 
heard  through  this  veil.  Dr.  Rock 1  gives  an  illustration,  from  a 
MS.  Flemish  Book  of  Hours,  of  a  priest  with  his  furred  amice 
on,  sitting  against  the  wall,  hearing  a  man's  Confession,  in 
open  view  of  everybody,  not  enclosed  in  anything  like  a  modern 
confessional,  which  is  of  very  recent  introduction. 

On  December  12,  in  the  same  year,  an  important  declaration, 
signed  by  Dr.  Pusey  and  twenty-eight  other  priests  of  good 
standing,  set  forth  the  doctrine  and  practice  of  Confession  and 
Absolution  as  authorized  in  the  Church  of  England. 

On  the  following  Ash  Wednesday,  Dean  Goulburn  of  Norwich 
is  reported  to  have  preached  a  sermon  in  the  cathedral  weakly 
submitting  to  the  popular  clamour,  and  at  the  same  time  he 
withdrew  from  publication  his  previous  writings  on  the  subject, 
in  which  he  had  admitted  the  value  of  the  practice  where  souls 
were  burdened  with  sin. 

The  public  were  again  stirred  up,  in  June  1877,  by  a  book 
issued,  only  privately,  to  Confessors,  by  the  Society  of  the 
Holy  Cross,  entitled  The  Priest  in  Absolution,  intended  as  a  guide 
to  Confessors  how  to  deal  with  their  penitents.    A  surgical 
1  Church  of  our  Fathers,  1853,  iii.  p.  224. 


"A  WOLF  IN  SHEEP'S  CLOTHING." 

Mb.  Erii,  [to  Bhitaknia).  "  WHENEVER  YOU  SEE  ANY  OF  THESE  SNEAKING  SCOUNDRELS  ABOUT,  MA'AM', 
JUST  SEND  FOR  ME.    I'LL  DEAL  WITH  'EM,  NEVER  FEAR  !  !  " 


AGITATION  AGAINST  CONFESSION  301 


treatise  is  not  intended  for  public  reading,  and  treatises  there 
are  on  special  diseases  that  are  only  for  the  eye  of  medical 
practitioners  j  and  the  priest  in  the  Confessional  has  to  deal 
with  sins  of  a  terrible  degree  of  criminality,  and  without  direc- 
tion, if  inexperienced,  he  can  hardly  know  how  to  treat  those 
who  have  perpetrated  them.  By  some  means  a  copy  got  into 
the  hands  of  Lord  Redesdale,  who  read  extracts  in  the  House 
of  Lords.  It  would  have  been  more  judicious  had  not  the 
book  been  printed.  But,  without  it,  Confessors  would  have 
been  driven  to  employ  Roman  books  to  the  same  effect :  these, 
being  printed  in  Latin,  were  not  meant  for  general  perusal.  The 
Confessor  sounds  the  depths  of  human  depravity,  but  does  so  only 
when  the  sinner  is  conscious  of  his  sin,  and  is  turning  earnestly 
to  the  source  of  healing.  Those  who  condemned  the  practice 
had  never  let  down  their  plummet  ten  inches  below  the  surface. 

The  saddest  fact  connected  with  this  attack  by  Lord  Redes- 
dale was  that  the  Archbishop  thanked  him  in  the  House  for 
the  exposure,  and  for  bringing  the  matter  before  the  notice  of 
his  fellow  peers. 

The  commotion  produced  a  bad  effect  generally.  The  English 
Church  Union  suffered,  as  there  ensued  some  resignations  of 
membership,  but  the  agitation  drew  attention  to  the  fact  that 
the  English  Church  did  open  a  fountain  for  all  uncleanness, 
and  the  result  was,  in  the  experience  of  the  Catholic  clergy, 
that  the  number  of  Confessions  greatly  increased,  especially 
among  those  who  had  been  grievous  sinners,  and  were,  and  had 
been  for  some  time,  "  wearied  with  the  burden  of  their  sins." 
What  is  not  sufficiently  understood  is  that  Direction  and  Con- 
fession do  not  necessarily  go  together.  A  man  goes  to  Confes- 
sion to  obtain  release  from  the  burden  of  his  transgression, 
as  Christ  has  committed  to  His  priesthood  the  power  of  the 
Keys.  But  for  Direction  he  goes  for  counsel  to  a  prudent 
adviser.  In  the  Eastern  Church,  every  parish  priest  can  hear 
Confessions  and  pronounce  Absolution,  but  the  penitent  does 
not  dream  of  applying  to  him  for  Direction  unless  he  be  experi- 
enced to  give  advice.  And  in  the  Roman  Church  it  is  much 
the  same.  The  penitent  chooses  his  own  Director,  and  does  not 
by  any  means  always  lay  his  perplexities  before  his  Confessor. 

The  Pall  Mall  Gazette  could  find  no  way  of  suppressing  the 
Catholic  Movement  but  "  to  run  a  short  Act  through  Parlia- 
ment prohibiting  the  laying  on  of  hands  and  so  bringing  the 
Anglican  Succession  to  an  end." 


302 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


It  was  discouraging  that  whenever  there  was  a  fresh  out- 
flare  of  hostility,  the  Bishops  were  found  on  the  wrong  side.  This 
had  not  been  the  case  at  Plymouth  with  the  disturbance  there 
about  Confession  in  1852 ;  then  Bishop  Phillpotts  stood  firmly 
by  Mr.  Prynne.  But  the  prelates  of  1870-80  (saving  Bishops 
Wilberforce  and  Hamilton)  were  of  other  stuff.  Of  all  men 
they  ought  to  have  taken  the  side  of  those  against  whom  the 
press  and  politicians  were  clamouring ;  they  were  bound  by 
every  consideration  to  uphold  those  whose  one  object  was  to 
win  souls  for  Christ,  and  against  whom  not  a  single  definite 
charge  of  abuse  of  their  office  had  been  brought.  A  man  in 
difficulties  connected  with  his  estate  consults  his  lawyer.  A 
man  who  is  sick  consults  his  physician.  And  those  in  trouble 
and  doubt,  and  in  anguish  over  past  sins,  have  a  right  to  seek 
advice  from  the  spiritual  guides  set  over  them  as  physicians  of 
the  soul. 

Instead  of  supporting  the  clergy,  the  Bishops  preserved  a  dis- 
creet silence,  or  deprecated  (this  was  the  correct  episcopal  word) 
— aye,  deprecated  the  use  of  this  means  of  grace.  Occasionally, 
when  the  Confessor  was  a  licensed  curate,  the  episcopal  dis- 
pleasure vented  itself  in  the  withdrawal  of  his  licence,  with- 
drawing from  him  therewith  the  means  of  livelihood. 

McNeile,  preaching  at  St.  Paul's,  Liverpool,  on  December  8, 
1880,  used  the  following  words  with  regard  to  the  use  of  private 
Confession  and  Absolution,  which  the  Prayer  Book,  that  he  had 
sworn  to  accept  and  use,  enjoined.  He  said  :  "I  would  make 
it  a  capital  offence  to  administer  Confession  in  this  country. 
Transportation  would  not  satisfy  me,  for  that  would  merely 
transfer  the  evil  from  our  part  of  the  world  to  another.  Capital 
punishment  alone  would  satisfy  me.  Death  alone  would  prevent 
the  evil." 

What  gave  special  cogency  to  the  attack  on  the  Confessional 
was  that  it  was  secret,  or,  to  use  the  favourite  term,  auricular. 
Is  not  the  intimate  disclosure  of  his  difficulties  to  a  solicitor 
auricular  ?  Is  not  that  of  a  patient  to  a  surgeon  private  ? 
And  what  would  be  thought  of  either  of  these  confidants,  to  whom 
difficulties  or  pains  are  confided,  if  lawyer  or  physician  were  to 
blurt  out  what  had  been  told  him  ?  A  priest  knows  that  to 
divulge  what  is  told  him  in  Confession  is  a  sacrilege  and  a  mortal 
sin.  Dr.  Sanday  reminds  us  that  "  it  does  not  follow  that 
everything  which  is  innocent  in  itself  will  bear  to  be  proclaimed 
from  the  house-tops,  or  that  all  that  cannot  be  proclaimed  must 


AGITATION  AGAINST  CONFESSION  303 


therefore  in  itself  be  mischievous."  An  end  to  all  confidence 
in  the  ordinary  transactions  of  life,  whether  legal,  medical,  com- 
mercial, or  religious,  would  follow,  unless  it  were  understood 
that  a  certain  amount  of  secrecy,  varying  of  course  according 
to  circumstances,  were  observed.  "  Nearly  a  dozen  years  ago," 
says  Dr.  Littledale  in  his  lecture  on  Secessions  to  Rome,  "  I 
was  travelling  in  Switzerland,  and  I  fell  in  with  an  English 
family,  consisting  of  a  mother,  two  daughters,  and  a  son.  The 
elder  lady  was,  I  believe,  a  chieftainness  in  Puritan  circles,  and 
she  had  brought  up  her  children  in  the  strictest  Calvinistic 
views.  I  fell,  to  talk  with  the  young  man,  and  somehow  we 
began  speaking  about  mental  distress  and  anxiety,  especially 
in  religious  matters.  He  put  a  case  to  me,  and  said  :  1  What 
would  you  do  under  such  circumstances  ?  '  1  Well,'  I  replied, 
1 1  would  go  to  some  clergyman  in  whom  I  had  confidence,  tell 
him  of  it,  and  ask  his  advice  ;  or,  plainly  speaking,  I  would 
go  to  Confession.'  '  But,'  urged  he,  '  how  would  you  guard 
against  a  breach  of  confidence  ?  1  I  answered  that  clergymen 
of  my  way  of  thinking  regarded  the  disclosure  of  anything 
entrusted  to  them  as  a  grave  offence.  1  Well,'  said  he,  '  I  was 
just  in  that  distress  some  time  back,  and  I  spoke  to  A  and  B, 
who  are  frequently  at  mother's  house  ' — and  here  he  named  two 
well-known  Evangelical  clergymen,  both  of  whom  were  subse- 
quently raised  to  high  rank.  1  A  would  not  listen  to  me,  and 
treated  the  matter  lightly,  though  I  was  in  real  trouble  ;  and 
B,  who  did  listen,  brought  out  the  whole  story  as  a  good  joke 
at  dinner  that  day  before  the  assembled  company.'  The  young 
man's  whole  feeling  of  trust  was  shaken,  and  his  religious  feelings 
rudely  checked,  just  when  they  needed  gentle  and  wise  en- 
couragement ;  and  if  a  clever  Roman  Catholic  or  a  clever  infidel 
had  taken  him  in  hand  just  then,  I  think  either  would  have 
found  an  easy  convert." 

Observe,  in  the  above  story,  A  and  B  were  of  the  stuff  of 
which  bishops  were  made.  Such  men,  of  course,  deprecated 
Confession,  because  incapable  of  diagnosing  the  distresses  of 
the  soul.  It  was  just  the  longing  to  unburden  the  conscience 
in  the  ears  of  one  capable  of  advising,  and  pledged  to  inviolable 
secrecy,  that  drove  men  to  private  Confession — Confession  to 
Catholic-minded  priests,  and  not  to  Evangelicals  whose  tongues 
are  not  always  under  control. 

How  it  was  that  Jackson,  who  could  preach  and  publish 
about  "  the  sinfulness  of  little  sins,"  should  put  any  obstacle 


304 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


in  the  way  of  those  who  were  moved,  not  only  to  confess  little 
sins,  but  to  pour  out  a  shameful  tale  of  gross  immoralities,  by 
ordering,  as  already  said,  the  curtains  to  be  removed  at  S. 
Alban's,  which  would  screen  them  from  the  eyes  of  curious 
busybodies,  is  a  marvel. 

In  town  churches,  no  doubt,  the  proper  place  for  hearing 
Confessions  is  the  body  of  the  church,  for  there  no  one  knows 
his  next-door  neighbour  ;  but  every  eye  is  open  to  all  that 
is  going  on,  and  every  action  liable  to  comment,  in  country 
places.  There  the  vestry  is  the  only  place  available  for  the 
purpose. 

Bishop  Festing  of  S.  Alban's,  who  belonged  to  a  higher  and 
wiser  type  of  prelate  than  those  generally  of  the  Victorian  age, 
made  a  point  of  recommending  the  newly  ordained  priests  to 
make  the  vestry,  supposing  the  body  of  the  church  could  not 
be  used,  the  place  for  all  spiritual  intercourse  with  members 
of  their  flocks.  Very  often  now  the  penitent  kneels  at  the 
Communion  rails,  and  the  priest  sits  on  the  chair  within.  But 
in  this  case  there  arises  the  difficulty  of  the  penitent  being 
exposed  to  the  impertinent  observation  of  any  one  entering 
the  church. 

That  which  led  many  right-minded  men  to  speak  against 
Confession  was  the  dread  lest  it  should  be  made  compulsory. 
A  little  inquiry  would  have  shown  them  that  this  fear  was 
groundless.  Any  one  who  has  lived  abroad  in  Roman  Catholic 
countries  will  have  learned  how  mischievous,  how  perilous  to 
souls  is  the  Roman  insistence  on  private  Confession  before 
Communion,  and  the  Anglican  rule  is  so  clearly  defined  that 
no  doubt  can  exist  as  to  what  the  mind  of  the  Church  is — that 
Confession  is  to  be  made  in  private  only  when  the  conscience 
is  stirred  with  remorse,  but  that  otherwise  public  Confession 
and  Absolution  suffice.  Doubters  might  have  learned  from 
common  sense  that  Confession  can  only  be  a  voluntary  act, 
and,  in  fact,  it  is  only  as  such  that  it  is  ever  urged. 

In  our  towns  or  in  country  parishes,  the  vast  number 
of  clergy  who  do  not  hear  Confessions  know  nothing  of  what 
is  going  on  below  the  surface.  They  skim  about  their  parishes 
like  water-spiders,  dashing  here  and  there,  making  great  show 
of  activity,  but  effecting  nothing,  because  they  know  nothing 
of  what  is  in  the  deeps  beneath  their  skipping  feet. 

The  doctrine  of  the  Church  relative  to  Confession  of  sin  is 
this.    As  the  Church  is  One  Body,  the  sin  of  any  one  member  is 


AGITATION  AGAINST  CONFESSION  305 


a  lesion  that  affects  the  whole.  The  faculty  of  pardoning  trans- 
gression resides  in  the  Church,  having  been  given  to  her  by 
Christ  in  express  words.  No  man  is  justified  in  absolving 
himself,  the  sentence  of  pardon  must  be  delivered  by  those 
authorized  by  the  whole  Church,  and  therefore  by  Christ. 

It  is  the  same  in  a  State.  No  criminal  may  acquit  himself  ; 
he  must  be  sentenced  or  acquitted  by  an  authorized  judge 
or  magistrate  receiving  power  to  do  so  from  the  King  or  the 
State. 

In  the  Early  Church,  Confession  was  in  public  and  Absolution 
was  granted  in  public  to  the  penitent.  But  not  infrequently 
the  sins  publicly  confessed  were  of  so  horrible  a  nature  that 
it  was  deemed  advisable  to  allow  the  Confession  to  be  made 
privately,  but  Absolution  was  accorded  in  full  congregation,  and 
at  last  the  concession  was  made  that  both  were  to  be  private. 

At  the  Reformation,  the  English  reformers  desired  to  recur 
as  far  as  might  be  to  the  primitive  rule,  and  accordingly 
introduced  the  Confession  and  Absolution  into  Morning  and 
Evening  Prayer  and  the  Holy  Communion,  to  be  public,  but 
without  specification  of  individual  sins.  Such  Confessions  are 
sufficient,  and  such  Absolutions  complete.  But  where  the 
conscience  is  burdened  and  distressed,  there  private  Confession 
and  Absolution  are  recommended.  Nothing  can  be  more  reason- 
able and  effective.  The  Romanist  practice  of  compulsory  Con- 
fession before  the  Holy  Communion  can  be  given  is  notoriously 
mischievous.  I  was  at  Sackingen,  a  manufacturing  town  of 
4,000  inhabitants,  on  the  Rhine,  in  1880.  The  immense  Abbey 
Church  had  been  handed  over  to  the  Old  Catholics,  and  the 
Romanists  had  built  a  "  Noth-Kirche,"  a  barrack-like  structure 
of  wood,  for  their  service.  In  the  Abbey  Church  on  the  Sunday 
morning  the  congregation  numbered  four  beside  myself,  and  of 
these  four  one  was  the  sacristan  ;  whereas  the  Roman  Catholic 
church  was  packed  throughout,  galleries  as  well  as  nave,  and 
men  stood  outside  under  umbrellas  in  the  rain,  forming  part 
of  the  congregation. 

I  spoke  to  the  sacristan  in  the  Abbey  Church,  and  asked  him 
how  it  was  that  there  was  no  congregation.  "  Oh,  we  have 
none.  The  people  will  not  come  to  us.  But  " — brightening 
up — "  you  should  see  us  at  Easter.  They  come  not  only  from 
the  town  but  from  the  villages  round  to  make  their  Easter 
Communion — to  escape  having  to  confess  to  their  parish  priests." 

The  Church  exacts  of  a  penitent,  as  token  of  sincere  repent- 
20 


306 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


ance,  that  there  shall  be  Contrition,  Confession,  and  Purpose  of 
Amendment,  and  Restitution  where  that  is  possible.  No  Abso- 
lution is  of  any  value  unless  there  be  sorrow  for  sin  committed 
and  determinate  resolve  to  avoid  commission  in  the  future. 

That  private  Confession  and  Absolution  are  open  to  abuse  is 
quite  certain.  It  is  this  which  rouses  the  anti-clericalism  of 
France,  as  it  is  felt  that  the  priest  may,  and  too  often  does, 
intermeddle  unwarrantably  in  affairs  of  the  family,  as  also  that 
he  endeavours  to  obtain  a  control  over  the  penitent  that  he 
has  no  right  to  exercise.  It  further  enfeebles  the  moral  fibre, 
and  makes  weak  natures  become  weaker,  because  releasing 
them  from  bracing  up  their  force  for  contest  against  besetting 
sins.  I  have  often  enough  heard  young  Romanists  talk  of 
being  "  whitewashed,"  and  I  do  not  think  that  in  the  Roman 
Confessional  sufficient  insistence  is  made  on  the  duty  of  Amend- 
ment. 

Feeble  and  feminine  characters  are  particularly  fond  of 
resort  to  Confession  when  no  serious  burden  of  sin  rests  on  them. 
John  Mason  Neale  was  one  day  in  Amiens  Cathedral,  when  he 
observed  a  woman  in  a  Confessional  box,  but  the  priest  was 
not  in  his  compartment,  but  at  a  little  distance,  behind  a  pillar, 
reciting  his  office  from  the  Breviary.  Neale  went  up  to  him, 
and  told  him  of  the  woman  making  her  Confiteor.  "  Oh,  I 
know  all  about  her,"  said  the  priest.  "  She  comes  every  week, 
and  it  is  always  the  same  sort  of  story.  She  overslept  herself 
on  Monday,  she  let  the  soup  boil  over  three  times,  neglected  to 
cross  herself  at  table  twice,  omitted  the  Angelus  four  times, 
and  so  on — I  know  how  long  she  will  take,  and  by  that  time  I 
shall  be  back  and  give  her  Absolution." 

But  till  private  Confession  of  serious,  deadly  sin  is  more 
practised,  we  shall  never  thoroughly  understand  the  trials  and 
needs  of  our  people. 

I  was  at  a  conference  of  Leeds  clergy  many  years  ago — and 
the  late  Rev.  N.  Green  we  11,  of  S.  Barnabas,  spoke  of  the  import- 
ance of  the  practice  among  factory  lads  and  lasses  ;  and  how 
it  was  in  his  opinion  the  one  means  of  keeping  some  straight 
and  saving  those  who  had  made  a  single  lapse.  An  Evangelical 
parson  was  present  ;  the  tears  came  into  his  eyes,  and  he  put 
his  hand  across  the  table  to  Mr.  Greenwell  and  said  with  a 
choke  in  his  voice,  "  You  are  dealing  with  your  factory  folk 
in  a  way  I  never  knew,  and  doing  what  I  never  have  been  able 
to  do." 


AGITATION  AGAINST  CONFESSION  307 


The  Church  Times  of  June  22,  1877,  had  an  article  on  the 
anti-Confessional  agitation  of  the  day.  "As  to  the  Seventh 
Commandment,  one  would  suppose  that  Lord  Redesdale  classes 
it  with  obsolete  or  expired  Acts  of  Parliament.  If  he  thinks 
there  is  no  need  for  the  clergy  to  concern  themselves  with  it, 
he  knows  as  little  as  his  own  black  moldiwarps  1  about  what  is 
going  on  in  the  world  about  him." 

We  live  now  in  a  different  world  from  that  of  1877.  The 
old  suspicions  have  disappeared,  the  old  bugbears  have  been 
revealed  as  scarecrows.  But  I  am  not  confident  that  there  is 
now,  especially  among  the  cultured  classes,  the  same  sense  of 
shortcoming,  of  neglect  of  duties,  of  tampering  with  evil,  that 
existed  from  thirty  to  forty  years  ago.  It  is  often  as  dangerous 
for  a  human  soul  to  treat  itself  as  it  is  for  a  sick  body  to 
have  recourse  to  advertised  nostrums,  or  neglect  symptoms.  It 
is  not  they  that  are  whole  that  need  the  physician,  but  they 
that  are  sick.  But  the  first  and  essential  condition  before 
recovery  is — that  they  should  know  that  they  are  sick. 

The  parochial  missions  which  have  become  so  general  amongst 
us  have  done  much  towards  breaking  down  the  dread  of  private 
Confession.    The  intimate  connection  which  the  parish  priest 
has  with  his  flock  in  this  country,  together  with  the  fact  that 
he  is  usually  a  married  man,  deters  many  from  making  use 
of  this  means  of  grace.    Although  the  English  clergyman  who 
would  receive  a  penitent  is  too  honourable  a  man  to  dream  of 
divulging  what  has  been  told  him  in  confidence,  yet  there  is 
always  the  haunting  fear  that  the  wife  of  his  bosom  may 
glean  from  him  some  hints  as  to  what  are  the  failings  of  her 
female  friends.    This  has  no  doubt  proved  a  hindrance  in  the 
way  of  many  who  would  have  been  glad  to  have  unburdened 
their  consciences  to  their  parish  priests.    But  the  mission  has 
removed  this  obstacle,  at  all  events  as  far  as  a  first  Confession 
is  concerned.    It  begins  by  rousing  the  conscience  to  a  sense 
of  sin  or  un worthiness,  it  gives  instruction  as  to  how  forgiveness 
may  be  obtained,  and  then  it  provides,  in  the  person  of  the 
missioner,  one  well  qualified  to  deal  with  souls.    For  the  training 
of  the  clergy  is  lamentably  deficient  in  many  respects,  and  in 
none  more  so  than  in  moral  theology,  and  a  penitent  is  justified 
in  availing  himself  of  the  permission  accorded  in  the  Prayer 
Book  to  resort,  if  need  be,  to  some  other  "  discreet  and 
learned  "  priest.    Only  it  should  be  remembered  that  "  discreet 
1  The  arms  of  the  Mitfords  are  three  black  moles. 


808  THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 

and  learned  "  are  technical  terms,  denoting  trained  men, 
authorized  by  the  bishop  to  undertake  this  duty.  Such  are 
the  priests  whom  the  Cowley  Community  and  that  of  the  Resur- 
rection at  Mirfield  send  round,  and  by  those  who  wish  to  avail 
themselves  of  the  ministry  of  Absolution  full  confidence  in 
their  fitness  for  their  office  may  be  entertained. 

That  Confession  may  be  abused,  both  by  Confessor  and  peni- 
tent, cannot  be  denied.  But  this  is  no  argument  against  the 
proper  use  of  the  institution,  and  anything  which  will  help  to 
remove  prejudice  and  dispel  ignorance  as  to  its  character  is  to 
be  valued.  One  feels  sure  that  many  of  those  terrible  disclosures 
made  public  in  the  Divorce  Court  would  never  have  occurred 
had  the  parties  been  accustomed  from  their  earliest  years  to 
open  their  griefs  to  God's  minister,  and  thus  obtain  not  only 
"  the  benefit  of  Absolution,"  but  also  "  ghostly  counsel  and 
advice."  No  one  can  read  Fifty  Years  at  S.  Alban's,  or  Father 
Dolling's  Life,  without  seeing  how  greatly  this  means  of  grace 
has  been  blessed  in  reclaiming  the  fallen  and  strengthening 
the  weak.  But  after  all,  the  main  thing  is  to  arouse  the  sinner 
to  a  sense  and  conviction  of  sin.  Then,  as  Dr.  Liddon  says, 
"  people  will  ask  to  come,  just  as  they  will  for  medicine  when 
they  are  sick  or  in  pain.  And  this  is  better  than  the  Roman 
system,  which,  by  enforcing  Confession  mechanically,  often 
makes  it  sacrilegious."  1 


1  Life,  p.  191. 


CHAPTER  XIV 


SECESSIONS 

MUCH  allowance  must  be  made  for  those  who  in  the 
early  period  of  the  Tractarian  movement  seceded  to 
Rome.  The  condition  of  the  English  Church  seemed 
hopeless,  beyond  the  power  of  man  to  recover  her 
out  of  the  depth  to  which  she  had  fallen. 

Earl  Grey  had  warned  the  Bishops  to  set  their  house  in  order, 
or  it  would  be  plucked  down  over  their  heads;  but  he,  Sir 
Robert  Peel,  Lord  Palmerston,  and  Lord  John  Russell  did  much 
to  prevent  the  Church  from  setting  her  house  in  order,  by 
appointing  to  the  vacant  thrones  prelates  incapable  of  doing 
what  was  needed,  men,  with  a  very  few  exceptions,  without 
initiative,  energy,  practical  experience.  If  the  house  was  to 
be  set  in  order,  this  was  to  be  done  not  by  those  who  were 
its  masters  and  were  responsible,  but  by  the  underlings.  It  was 
much  as  though  a  domestic  mansion  possessed  master  and  mistress 
who  cared  nothing  for  the  habitation,  its  disorder,  its  dirt,  its 
ruin  ;  and  only  the  scullery  maid,  the  housemaid,  and  the 
stable-boy  entertained  any  solicitude  for  the  decencies,  to  keep 
it  clean,  dust  the  furniture,  polish  the  windows,  rub  the  rust 
from  the  fire-irons,  and  put  sweet  hay  in  the  horse-racks.  But 
that  similitude  would  be  incomplete,  unless  we  added  that 
the  owners  of  the  house  were  disposed  to  chide  the  faithful 
domestics,  "  deprecate  "  their  energy,  and  protest  that  they 
liked  to  see  the  rust,  they  savoured  the  smell  of  mildew,  they 
admired  the  curtains  riddled  with  holes,  they  preferred  to  scrawl 
their  initials  with  fingers  in  the  dust  upon  the  sideboards,  and 
they  wished  the  horses  in  the  stables  to  be  kept  half -starved. 
In  such  a  case  would  it  be  wonderful  if  the  faithful  domestics 
should  throw  up  their  charge  in  despair  ? 

This  was  the  state  of  affairs  in  the  Anglican  Church.  Every 
attempt  to  produce  decency  in  worship  and  to  elevate  the 
religious  tone  was  discouraged.    Those  who  were  true  were 

309 


310 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


browbeaten  and  inhibited  from  doing  any  more.  Is  it,  then, 
any  wonder  that,  sick  at  heart  and  in  despair,  they  quitted  the 
Church  ?  The  Roman  communion  was  by  no  means  attractive, 
but  there  was  in  her  vigorous  life,  and  they  fled  from  what 
they  thought  was  moribund  to  a  body  in  which  at  least  there 
was  vitality. 

The  Early  Tractarians  lost  heart  too  soon.  They  should 
have  remembered  those  Roman  citizens  who,  when  the  Gauls 
surrounded  the  walls,  bought  the  farms  that  had  been  devastated 
by  the  barbarians — not  despairing  of  the  Republic.1 

They  should  have  looked  across  the  North  Sea  to  Germany 
and  taken  a  lesson  thence.  The  parallel  is  so  instructive  that 
I  venture  here  to  draw  it  out,  as  briefly  as  I  may.  The  lethargy 
that  hung  over  the  Catholic  Church  in  Germany  after  the 
Thirty  Years'  War,  for  nearly  a  century,  was  not  broken  by 
any  signs  of  awaking.  The  Bishops  were  princes  of  the  Empire, 
and  left  the  discharge  of  their  episcopal  functions  to  their 
vicars  and  choir-bishops.  Several  bishoprics  were  held  by  the 
same  man,  and  his  duties  in  none  were  personally  discharged. 
But  that  was  not  all.  They  encouraged  the  most  advanced 
Rationalism. 

The  ecclesiastical  electorates  had  been  amongst  the  most 
slavish  followers  and  imitators  of  the  luxury,  licentiousness, 
and  extravagance  of  the  French  Court.  Naturally,  therefore, 
Voltaire  and  his  school,  being  in  fashion  in  France,  were  also 
in  fashion  in  these  ecclesiastical  principalities,  and  paved  the 
way  to  an  easy  admission  of  the  unbelieving  tendencies  of 
the  day. 

The  Electorate  of  Treves  was  the  first  affected.  In  1778 
Clemens  Wenceslaus  succeeded  to  the  see,  and  was  possessed 
of  about  as  much  knowledge  as  might  be  expected  from  a 
cavalry  officer,  which  had  been  his  previous  position.  In  the 
University  of  Treves,  one  of  the  canons  and  professors  taught 
that  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  was  an  invention  of  the  school- 
men— he  received  no  censure. 

The  archiepiscopal  throne  of  Cologne  was  held  in  the  latter 
part  of  the  eighteenth  century  by  Maximilian  Frederick,  and 
after  him  by  Maximilian  Francis.  Both  of  them  introduced 
rationalism  into  the  diocese.    The  University  of  Bonn  was  the 

1  miserum  est  opus, 
Igitur  demum  fodere  puteum,  ubi  sitio  fauces  tenet. 

Plaut.,  Mostellaria,  ii.  1. 


SECESSIONS 


311 


focus  of  such  teaching.  It  taught  that  the  expressions,  Word, 
Light,  Life,  used  of  our  Lord  in  S.  John's  Gospel,  were  borrowed 
from  the  Gnostics. 

At  Mainz,  the  Archbishop  Emmerich  Joseph  was  gained 
over  to  the  same  school,  but  his  successor,  the  last  Elector  of 
Mainz,  did  most  towards  fostering  rationalism  in  the  diocese. 
In  his  university  efforts  were  made  to  obtain  the  annexation 
of  the  Protestants,  by  the  suppression  of  doctrines  and  rites 
obnoxious  to  them  and  the  abolition  of  the  Religious  Orders. 

To  be  brief — in  these  prince-bishoprics  every  encouragement 
was  held  out  to  laxity  in  the  Faith.  The  Bishops  were  temporal 
princes,  and  could  stop  the  promulgation  of  false  doctrines 
if  they  chose,  but  instead  of  doing  so  they  encouraged  them. 
Thus  it  was  that  disbelief  was  spreading  throughout  Catholic 
Germany,  favoured  by  the  Bishops,  till  the  Revolution  came 
and  these  ecclesiastical  States  were  swept  away. 

And  now — go  into  all  these  dioceses  and  you  will  find  the 
churches  crowded,  the  Faith  kept,  hymn  and  psalm  go  up  in 
thunder  to  God — and  the  retention  of  all  religion  there  is  due, 
not  to  the  Bishops,  but  to  humble  parish  priests,  whose  names 
are  forgotten  here  below,  who  did  their  duty  and  taught  the 
Faith,  but  whose  names  are  written  in  the  Book  of  Life, 
from  which  those  of  the  prince-bishops  set  over  them  have 
been  scored  out  with  a  pen  dipped  in  the  blackest  ink.1 

I  have  dwelt  on  this  phase  of  Church  history  in  Germany 
because  the  parallel  is  instructive  to  us.  As  in  Germany  the 
true  faith  was  maintained,  so  that  it  lives  and  flourishes  to  the 
present  day,  through  the  earnestness  and  loyalty  of  the  parish 
priests,  and  not  through  the  prelates,  so  was  it  with  the 
English  Church.  The  Faith  and  the  Worship  of  the  Sanctuary 
were  saved  by  them  in  defiance  of  the  Bishops  and  the  State. 

The  mistake  made  by  the  Early  Tractarians  consisted  in 
this,  that  they  looked  upon  the  Bishops  as  the  conservators  of 
the  Faith  ;  they  invested  them  with  an  ideal  halo,  as  if  they 
had  borne  any  resemblance  to  the  prelates  of  ancient  days. 
They  regarded  them  as  divinely  constituted  guides  and  rulers, 
whereas  they  were  incompetent  to  be  either.  If  they  attempted 
to  rule,  they  ruled  crooked  lines  ;  if  they  essayed  to  act  as 
guides,  they  were  Jacks-o '-lantern  leading  into  miry  places. 

The  Bishops  had  accorded  to  them  the  faculty  of  keeping 
up  the  breed,  and  that  was  about  all  that  they  did.    They  were 
1  See  an  article  in  the  Union  Review  for  1869. 


312 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


qualified  to  ordain  priests,  and  give  mission  j  to  continue  the 
succession  by  consecrating  bishops.  That  was  the  limit  of 
their  capabilities. 

The  Early  Tract arians  looked  for  what  was  not  to  be  found, 
and  were  staggered  not  to  find  it.  They  supposed  that  bishops 
would  be  as  war-horses  rushing  into  the  battle,  and  when, 
instead,  they  found  them  halter-led  along  the  high  road  by  a 
Prime  Minister,  they  reeled  back,  bit  their  thumbs,  and  jumped 
over  the  hedge. 

In  the  Ancient  Welsh  and  Irish  Churches,  the  Bishops  were 
without  jurisdiction.  They  were  kept  in  every  abbey  and 
convent  to  consecrate  bishops  and  ordain  priests.  Bridget  of 
Kildare  had  her  tame  prelate  whom  she  ordered  about  as  she 
might  her  bootboy.  But  the  Tractarians  did  not  realize  that 
in  the  nineteenth  century  there  might  be  a  reversion  to  the 
condition  of  affairs  that  existed  in  the  Celtic  Church.  Bishops 
have  accorded  to  them  by  God  three  faculties,  powers,  and  duties 
to  perform:  to  maintain  the  Apostolic  Succession  and  give 
mission,  to  rule  the  Church  in  their  dioceses,  and  to  be  guardians 
of  the  Faith.  Now  the  prelates  appointed  by  Whig  Prime 
Ministers,  and  by  others  nearly  as  bad,  were  not  guardians  of  the 
Faith  by  any  means.  As  rulers  they  did  all  in  their  power  to 
prevent  the  spiritual  work  that  was  stirring  in  the  Church, 
and  they  were  good  for  nothing  save  to  ordain  and  keep  up 
the  succession. 

It  was  not  merely  the  failure  of  the  Bishops  to  take  the  lead 
in  the  movement  that  discouraged  the  Tractarians.  It  was  their 
combined,  prolonged,  and  persistent  opposition  that  discouraged 
and  sent  so  many  over.  At  the  rebuilding  of  the  wall  of  Jeru- 
salem we  are  told  that  "  the  rulers  were  behind  all  the  house  of 
Judah."  But  it  was  not  that  the  Bishops  lagged  behind  that 
was  so  disheartening,  but  that  they  were  in  league  with  San- 
ballat  and  Tobiah  in  obstructing  the  work  of  the  Lord. 

There  occurred  several  events  which  served  to  shake  the 
confidence  of  the  Tractarians  in  the  Catholicity  of  the  English 
Church.  The  first  of  these  was  a  blow  that  led  eventually  to 
the  secession  of  John  Henry  Newman.  This  was  the  institution 
of  the  Jerusalem  Bishopric  in  1841.  The  project  began  with 
Frederick  William  IV  of  Prussia,  who  was  desirous  of  intro- 
ducing episcopacy  by  a  side-door  into  the  "  Evangelical  Church  " 
that  had  been  created  by  Frederick  William  III,  who  had 
swept  Lutheranism  and  Calvinism  aside  and  instituted  a  new 


SECESSIONS 


313 


sect  as  an  Established  Church  in  his  own  dominions.  It 
reposed,  solidly  on  no  Confession  of  Faith,  but  rested  on  the 
Bible  as  any  man  chose  to  interpret  it. 

Baron  Bunsen  was  sent  to  England  to  negotiate  a  union 
between  Prussia  and  the  English  Church  in  the  establishment 
of  a  Jerusalem  Bishopric,  the  appointment  to  the  bishopric  to 
be  alternately  in  the  hands  of  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury 
and  the  King  of  Prussia,  but  the  nominee  of  the  latter  was  to 
receive  episcopal  consecration  in  England.  The  English  Govern- 
ment favoured  the  scheme,  as  did  also  Howley,  Archbishop  of 
Canterbury,  and  Blomfield,  Bishop  of  London.  These  two 
prelates  acted  in  good  faith  ;  they  thought  that  by  this  means 
the  Evangelical  "  Church  "  of  Prussia  might  be  enabled  to  obtain 
that  wherein  it  was  deficient,  episcopal  mission  and  the  Apos- 
tolic Succession.  But  neither  of  them  knew  or  understood  what 
an  emasculated  and  worthless  creature  of  the  State  the  Evan- 
gelische  Kirche  actually  was.  Bunsen  gained  the  help  of  Lord 
Palmerston  and  Lord  Ashley  (afterwards  Shaftesbury),  and  the 
treaty  between  the  Governments  was  signed  July  15,  1841.  A 
Bill  to  constitute  this  bishopric  was  introduced  into  the  House 
of  Lords  and  became  law  on  October  5,  1841. 

By  this  Act  the  Bishop  was  to  be  given  jurisdiction  over  all 
Protestant  congregations  in  the  East,  beside  such  Anglicans  as 
were  there.  The  Bishop  was  to  ordain  German  pastors  on  their 
signing  the  Confession  of  Augsburg.  In  public  worship,  the 
English  would  use  the  Prayer  Book,  foreign  Protestants  their 
own  formularies.  The  Evangelicals  applauded  the  scheme  with 
both  hands,  the  Liberal  Churchmen  as  well,  as  a  first  step 
towards  broadening  the  basis  of  Church  membership. 

But  voices  were  raised  in  protest.  The  Bishop  of  Exeter 
spoke  out  in  remonstrance,  and  John  Henry  Newman  issued  his 
protest  as  well.  It  was  felt,  and  felt  extensively,  that  this  was 
a  compromise  of  Church  principles,  an  unequal  yoking  together 
of  dogmatic  and  undogmatic  Christianity  j  the  linking  in  unholy 
union  of  a  Church  with  traditions  going  back  to  Augustine  and 
Gregory,  with  one  dating  from  1817  alone  j  of  a  Church  founded 
on  Apostles  and  Prophets,  with  Jesus  Christ  as  chief  corner- 
stone, and  one  reposing  on  no  surer  basis  than  a  Prussian  king. 

If  there  had  been  purpose  to  obtain  an  Episcopate  with 
Apostolic  mission  for  the  Lutheran  Communion,  that  would 
have  been  another  matter,  for  the  Lutherans  had  definite  beliefs, 
and  the  old  heresy  of  Luther  was  practically  discarded  ;  they 


314 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


were,  on  the  whole,  orthodox,  and  they  had  retained  the  ex- 
ternals of  Catholic  worship.  But  it  was  quite  another  matter 
with  the  "  Evangelical  Church,"  which  had  hardly  any  definite 
beliefs,  no  service  book  in  the  smallest  degree  filiating  from  the 
ancient  liturgies. 

The  first  bishop  appointed  was  a  Polish  converted  Jew,  named 
Alexander,  who  was  consecrated  by  Archbishop  Howley  and 
sent  to  Jaffa  in  an  English  man-of-war  with  great  flourish  of 
trumpets,  attended  by  his  suite.  He  drew  his  stipend  for  some 
years,  did  little  else,  and  died  in  1845.  To  him  succeeded  a 
Swiss,  Gobat,  and  again  Bishop  Phillpotts  issued  his  protest. 
Gobat  was  consecrated  by  Archbishop  Howley  in  1846.  Gobat 
made  himself  extremely  objectionable  in  his  attempts  to  prosely- 
tize among  the  native  Christians.  This  roused  great  indigna- 
tion among  English  Churchmen,  and  a  protest  couched  in  Greek 
was  drawn  up  and  signed  by  over  a  thousand  English  priests 
and  sent  to  the  eastern  Patriarchs.  Gobat,  who  was  involved 
in  quarrels  with  both  the  English  residents  at  Jerusalem  and 
with  the  authorities,  died  in  1879,  and  was  succeeded  by  Joseph 
Barclay,  the  first  native  of  Great  Britain  to  occupy  the  see. 
The  King  of  Prussia  made  no  attempt  to  exercise  his  right  to 
nominate  a  successor,  and  the  treaty  of  1841  was  torn  up  in 
1886.  "  I  never  heard  of  any  good  or  harm  the  Jerusalem 
Bishopric  has  ever  done,"  wrote  Newman  in  1865,  "  except 
what  it  has  done  to  me.  .  .  .  It  brought  me  on  to  the  beginning 
of  the  end." 

The  bishopric  was  reconstructed  on  totally  different  lines  by 
Archbishop  Benson  in  1887  ;  on  this  occasion  it  was  the  Evan- 
gelicals who  objected,  because  it  was  distinctly  understood  that 
no  attempts  were  to  be  made  to  proselytize,  but  that  friendly 
intercourse  was  to  be  maintained  with  the  Greek  and  Syrian 
Churches. 

A  much  severer  blow  was  dealt  to  Churchmen  by  the  Gorham 
Judgment  in  1850.  Although  in  the  Baptismal  Service,  after 
the  child  has  been  christened,  the  priests  declare,  "  Seeing  now 
that  this  child  is  regenerate,"  the  Privy  Council  decided  that 
denial  of  Baptismal  Regeneration  did  not  disqualify  a  priest 
from  ministering  in  the  Church  and  holding  a  benefice  in  the 
same. 

These  points  came  then  to  be  considered  by  every  priest  in 
the  English  Church : 

(1)  The  Judgment  of  the  Judicial  Committee  of  the  Privy 


SECESSIONS 


315 


Council  asserts  that  the  Church  of  England  allows  formal  heresy 
to  be  taught  by  her  priests. 

(2)  If  the  decision  of  the  Judicial  Committee  be  the  voice  of 
the  English  Church,  she  is  actively  committed  to  heresy. 

(3)  If  the  decision  of  the  Judicial  Committee,  which  claims 
to  be  the  voice  of  the  Church,  be  not  protested  against  by  that 
Church,  she  is  passively  committed  to  heresy. 

(4)  On  either  of  these  two  latter  suppositions,  it  is  the 
bounden  duty  of  all  the  members  of  the  English  Church,  as 
they  value  the  salvation  of  their  souls,  to  go  out  of  her. 

But  against  this  it  was  urged  that  the  Privy  Council  did  not 
profess  to  define  doctrine  and  be  the  voice  of  the  Church  at  all, 
but  merely  to  point  out  within  what  limits,  in  the  eye  of  the 
law,  teaching  might  be  allowed  which  would  enable  the  teacher 
to  enjoy  the  pounds,  shillings,  and  pence  of  a  benefice  in  the 
Church.  The  Judgment  could  not  and  did  not  compromise  the 
Church,  any  more  than  the  Catholic  Church  was  compromised 
when  Constantius  forced  Arian  prelates  into  the  sees  of 
orthodoxy. 

Eventually  Archdeacon  Manning  and  a  good  many  more  did 
secede  to  Rome  on  account  of  the  Gorham  Judgment ;  but 
such  men  as  Pusey,  Keble,  Samuel  Wilberforce,  and  Gladstone 
realized  that  this  was  purely  a  State  decision. 

The  Judgment  was  not  without  effecting  some  good :  it  cleared 
men's  minds  as  to  the  nature  of  the  Privy  Council  and  the 
value  of  its  decisions,  and  further,  it  led  to  the  revival  of 
Convocation. 

Subsequent  decisions  in  cases  of  ecclesiastical  appeals  were 
regarded  without  trepidation.  In  Ritual  cases  they  produced 
inconvenience  and  were  disregarded.  It  had  become  clear  that 
they  carried  with  them  no  moral  obligation. 

But  the  inconvenience — the  prohibition  of  vestments,  lights, 
and  the  Eastward  position — irritated,  and  men  went  over  to 
Rome  rather  than  be  engaged  in  incessant  conflict  with  the  law 
and  bear  the  taunts  of  Broad  Churchmen  and  Evangelicals,  who 
called  them  law-breakers  because  they  would  not  submit  to  the 
rulings  of  courts  which  encroached  on  the  rights  and  liberties  of 
the  Church. 

That  which,  more  than  anything  else,  drove  hard-working 
clergy  over,  was  the  attitude  taken  up  by  the  Bishops  against 
Confession.  These  men  knew  by  experience  that  they  were 
rescuing  souls  from  the  clutches  of  the  devil,  rousing  them  to 


316 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


newness  of  life;  and  they  were  denounced  for  so  doing.  The 
Bishops  and  the  press  called  them  by  evil  names — what  could 
they  think,  but  that  the  Church  of  England  was  so  committed 
to  the  world  and  the  devil  that  it  was  hopeless  for  them,  poor 
isolated  and  contemned  priests,  to  strive  any  longer  in  such  a 
Communion  for  the  saving  of  perishing  souls  ?  In  a  thousand 
cases,  there  was  no  question  as  to  their  Orders,  none  as  to  the 
validity  of  the  Sacraments ;  there  was  no  great  attraction 
exercised  by  the  Papacy :  it  was  simply  the  hunger  after  the 
salvation  of  souls  that  led  them  to  desert  the  Anglican  Com- 
munion, in  which  every  possible  impediment  was  put  in  the 
way  of  doing  this  work,  a  work  in  which  frankly  and  cheerfully 
it  was  recognized  lay  the  highest  duty  of  a  priest  of  God. 

In  the  early  days  of  the  Oxford  Movement,  the  beautiful 
chapel  on  Wakefield  Bridge  that  had  been  erected  by  Edward  IV 
had  long  been  used  as  a  lumber  room,  containing  empty  casks. 
It  was  restored  under  the  care  of  the  incumbent  of  the  parish, 
and  reopened  for  Divine  worship.  He  had  furnished  the  chapel 
with  an  altar,  and  had  placed  on  it  a  cross  of  carved  oak,  with 
a  sunk  panel  at  the  intersection  of  the  arms,  containing  a 
representation  of  the  Sacred  Lamb.  Popular  Protestantism 
took  alarm  ;  a  fanatical  mob  invaded  the  chapel  and  threw  the 
cross  from  the  altar,  and  in  so  doing  split  the  pedestal.  Dis- 
couraged by  the  outbreak,  and  despairing  of  the  English  Church, 
the  vicar  seceded  to  Rome,  and  sent  back  the  cross  to  the 
wood-carver  in  Cambridge  from  whom  he  had  purchased  it. 
From  this  man  I  bought  it  in  1853  ;  and,  singularly  enough,  it 
returned  in  1864  to  the  neighbourhood  of  Wakefield,  where,  in 
1865,  it  found  a  place  in  amission  started  in  an  outlying  factory 
district  of  Horbury.  There  the  cross  stood  on  the  mantelshelf 
of  the  upper  chamber  in  a  two-roomed  cottage.  Before  the 
fireplace  was  a  narrow  footpace  for  the  missioner.  The  con- 
gregation not  only  occupied  the  chapel-chamber,  but  also  the 
stairs  and  the  kitchen  below.  When  a  favourite  hymn  was  being 
sung,  the  strain  rippled  down  the  staircase,  and  came  up  lag- 
gingly  from  the  nether  chamber,  through  the  chinks  in  the  floor, 
like  the  voice  of  "  Old  Mole,"  Hamlet's  father's  ghost. 

In  course  of  a  few  years  a  commodious  school-chapel  was 
erected,  and  the  cross  was  transferred  thither.  But  a  certain 
young  and  wealthy  layman,  recently  awakened  to  the  things 
of  God,  presented  to  the  mission-chapel  a  brass  altar-cross,  and 
that  of  wood  was  displaced.    The  donor,  however,  did  not 


SECESSIONS 


317 


remain  in  the  Anglican  Communion.  He  also  seceded.  The 
Wakefield  Bridge  cross  eventually  found  a  home  on  the  altar 
of  a  parish  church  in  Devonshire,  where  it  remained  for  twenty 
years,  till  the  parishioners — not  thinking  it  grand  enough — sub- 
scribed their  sixpences  and  pennies  for  one  of  brass.  Now  the 
old  cross  has  taken  a  back  place  in  a  window.  What  experiences 
it  has  gone  through  !  If  it  could  talk,  what  a  tale  it  would  un- 
fold of  buoyant  hopes  and  cruel  disappointments,  what  a  story 
of  the  progress  of  the  Catholic  Revival  in  the  English  Church  ! 

The  movement  has  been  like  the  flow  of  a  stream  of  molten 
iron  from  a  furnace,  at  first  throwing  off  a  shower  of  scintillations, 
that  flashed  out  as  stars,  and  fell  down  slag — a  flow  surmount- 
ing all  obstacles,  burning  up  all  obstructions.  As  these  sparks 
arrested  and  dazzled  the  eye  when  they  flashed  into  sight,  so 
did  the  secessions  attract  much  notice  and  create  alarm.  There 
were  many  at  first,  then  they  became  progressively  fewer,  with 
only  spasmodic  outbursts. 

It  is  well  to  consider  what  were  the  motives  inducing  men 
to  "go  over  "  to  Rome,  in  addition  to  those  already  mentioned, 
and  which  occurred  at  the  outset,  before  Churchmen  had  found 
their  feet :  motives,  rather  than  convictions — for,  at  least  to 
my  mind,  it  seems  hard  to  suppose  that  any  persons  could  be 
convinced  of  the  claims  of  the  Papacy  who  knew  the  history  of 
the  Latin  Church,  unless  blindly  predisposed  thereto.  In  fact, 
the  history  of  the  Papacy  is  the  most  complete  refutation  of  its 
claims  to  be  a  Divine  institution. 

I  do  not  for  a  moment  pretend  to  give  all  the  motives  for 
"  Verting."  I  give  only  such  as  have  been  most  common,  and 
have  come  under  my  own  notice.  There  have  been  others, 
certainly,  and  there  have  been  sincere  convictions,  but  the 
desire  to  be  convinced  almost  invariably  precedes  conviction. 
When  a  man  wants  to  believe  that  the  moon  is  a  cheese,  he  easily 
assures  himself  that  it  is  so.  He  sees  in  it  the  bubbles  of 
Gruyere  with  the  naked  eye. 

One  motive  for  "  'verting  "  was  discouragement  at  the  slow- 
ness of  the  progress  of  the  revival.  Men  were  disappointed 
that  they  did  not  obtain  at  once  the  success  they  had  anticipated. 
They  lost  patience  because  their  efforts  did  not  meet  with  im- 
mediate response.  Grass  does  not  spring  up  in  a  night  after  a 
shower.  It  is  Jonah's  gourd  that  leaps  to  fullness  in  a  night, 
and  in  a  night  withers  away.  It  is  the  toadstool  only  that 
attains  completeness  in  a  few  hours. 


318 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


In  fact,  these  men  were  influenced  by  the  Wesleyan  doctrine 
of  sudden  conversion — that  a  man  who  is  a  child  of  Satan  at 
twenty  minutes  to  six,  by  a  sudden  internal  commotion  of  the 
ganglions  becomes  an  elect  saint  at  six  o'clock.  They  con- 
ceived that  those  who,  in  their  past  life,  had  been  steeped  in 
Protestant  negations,  should  make  a  volte-face  at  their  words, 
and  become  in  a  day  convinced  Anglo-Catholics.  Why,  even  a 
snake,  to  get  rid  of  its  old  skin,  has  to  wedge  itself  between 
two  stones  and  writhe  till  it  can  shed  the  enamelled  hide  that 
has  become  too  strait  for  its  expanding  life. 

In  the  early  days  of  the  Oxford  Movement,  the  secessions 
caused  by  the  Gobat  and  Gorham  troubles,  and  the  antagonism 
of  the  Bishops,  produced  widespread  mistrust  and  alarm,  and 
checked  the  movement,  paralysed  it  almost.  At  the  present 
day  they  produce  almost  no  effect.  Men  curl  their  lips  and 
shrug  their  shoulders,  and  put  the  change  down  to  some  mental 
or  moral  taint  in  the  individual.  The  judgment  passed  is 
usually  partial,  but  all  agree  that  the  loss  is  of  no  serious  conse- 
quence. The  newspapers  teem  with  accounts  of  suicides,  and 
the  general  verdict  is  that  it  is  sad  for  those  who  have  put  an 
end  to  their  own  existence,  but  that  the  world  rubs  along  very 
well  without  them.  And  so,  in  religious  matters,  the  Church 
of  England  need  not  concern  herself  greatly  over  a  dozen  or  a 
couple  of  dozen  seceders  ;  she  is  sorry  for  them,  but  their  defect 
is  hardly  felt.  We  get  rid  of  our  cranks  when  we  install  electric 
bell- wires. 

I  myself  very  greatly  doubt  whether  the  balance  is  not  made 
up  by  those  who  migrate  from  the  Roman  Communion  to  the 
English  Church,  and  these  are  far  more  than  is  generally  sup- 
posed. One  of  these  said  to  me  not  long  ago :  "  Wait  a  bit. 
When  you  have  further  shaken  off  your  Protestantism,  there 
will  be  a  landslide,  and  masses  of  the  old  Romans,  who  abominate 
Vaticanism,  will  come  over  to  the  English  Church." 

Meanwhile  the  Roman  Catholic  papers  publish  reports  of 
conversions  that  I  doubt  have  been  really  made.  Here  is  one 
of  these  (1911) : 

"  The  Irish  papers  publish,  on  the  basis  of  an  episcopal  state- 
ment, an  interesting  collection  of  statistics  with  regard  to  con- 
versions to  the  Catholic  Church  in  England  during  the  last 
five  years.  These  collected  statistics  contain  the  names  of  572 
members  of  the  clergy  of  the  Anglican  Church,  22  of  the  Scottish 
Episcopal  Church,  and  12  clergymen  of  the  Nonconformist 


SECESSIONS 


319 


Dissenters.  During  the  same  period  29  male  and  53  female 
members  of  noble  families,  and  63  members  of  the  highest 
orders  of  the  State  (in  all  577),  came  over  to  the  Catholic  Church. 
Of  officers  in  the  Army  306,  and  of  the  Navy  63  are  given  as 
converts,  and  more  than  1,000  persons  with  academical  degrees, 
of  whom  586  were  of  the  University  of  Oxford.  Of  the  converts 
612  became  clergymen,  and  100  members  of  the  Order  of  Jesuits/' 

"  The  wish,  Harry,  is  father  to  the  thought."  The  whole 
paragraph  is  absurd.  In  the  last  thirty  years  I  have  known 
personally  only  four  secede rs,  and  two  of  these  were  women. 
One  was  a  priest,  who  set  up  a  chapel  near  where  he  had  been 
curate,  hoping  to  draw  after  him  a  number  of  the  faithful, 
and  secured  none.    A  second  lapsed  into — I  cannot  say  what. 

Now  we  have  the  columns  of  the  principal  Roman  organ,  the 
Tablet,  that  chronicles  all  secessions.  The  Rev.  Percy  Dearmer 
has  carefully  examined  the  files  of  the  Tablet  for  the  five  years 
under  consideration,  with  the  following  results  : 

"  The  Tablet  gives  19  clergy  of  the  Church  of  England  instead 
of  572  ;  2  of  the  Episcopal  Church  of  Scotland,  instead  of  22  ; 
none  of  Ireland  ;  only  about  6  persons  who  can  be  brought 
under  the  head  of  noble  families  or  higher  orders  in  the  State, 
instead  of  577  ;  two  officers  of  the  Army  and  Navy  instead  of 
369 ;  11  graduates  from  the  Universities  instead  of  1,000. 
This  makes  in  all  40  persons  instead  of  a  minimum  of  2,352." 

Then,  again,  no  record  is  kept  of  those  who  leave  the  Roman 
Communion,  and  either  join  the  English  Church  or,  what  is 
more  common,  lapse  into  indifference  to  all  religion.  I  have 
known  not  a  few  of  these  latter,  and  some  of  the  former.  Let 
any  of  my  readers  muster  those  whom  he  has  known  who  have 
seceded  in  the  last  quarter  of  a  century,  and  he  will  recognize 
how  scant  are  the  numbers.  As  the  Catholic  faith  is  taught 
and  the  Sacraments  are  more  frequently  and  more  reverently 
celebrated,  those  raised  in  the  Anglican  Church  feel  no  dis- 
position to  leave  her.  They  obtain  in  her  all  that  their  souls 
desire,  and  they  are  not  cumbered  with  the  superstitions,  frauds, 
and  falsehoods  which  are  the  curse  of  Latin  Christianity,  that 
shock  and  repel  the  healthy  mind.  The  Papacy  cannot  get 
rid  of  its  past,  its  false  Decretals,  its  Inquisition  and  autos-da-fe, 
the  massacres  in  the  Albigensian  Crusade,  its  indulgenced  dolls 
and  privileged  altars. 

The  Bishop  of  Bristol,  for  his  Visitation  Charge  of  19 12,  took 
steps  to  explode  the  statements  which  from  time  to  time  appear 


320 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


in  Roman  Catholic  journals  as  to  the  number  of  English  clergy 
who  join  the  Roman  Church.  He  made  inquiries  in  the  several 
dioceses,  and  found  that  during  the  last  five  years  the  "  number 
of  Roman  clergy  who  have  approached  our  diocesan  bishops 
with  a  view  to  admission  to  minister  in  the  National  Church 
is  larger,  absolutely,  not  merely  relatively,  than  the  number 
of  our  clergy  who  have  joined  the  Church  of  Rome,  and  the 
number  actually  admitted  is  relatively  considerable."  He 
added  that  "  during  his  own  experience  as  a  bishop  several 
Roman  priests  have  come  to  him,  chiefly  when  he  was  Bishop 
of  Stepney,  and  he  had  not  been  able  to  recommend  one  of 
them  to  the  Archbishop  for  admission."  The  Bishop  continued  : 
"  The  result  of  our  conversations  was  that  I  quite  saw  the 
force  of  their  desire  to  leave  their  ministry,  but  I  could  not 
see  why  they  should  come  to  us." 

w  I  think,"  said  Mrs.  Gossett,  "  that  this  Brussels  carpet  is 
becoming  threadbare  near  the  table  and  by  the  door.  I  will 
have  it  turned,  and  it  will  be  as  good  as  new."  A  very  potent 
motive,  especially  among  the  clergy,  for  secession,  was  that 
they,  like  Mrs.  Gossett 's  carpet,  would  be  better  for  being  turned. 
They  were  becoming  threadbare.  In  their  first  enthusiasm 
they  had  set  themselves  a  higher  standard  of  life  than  they 
felt  themselves  capable  of  permanently  maintaining.  The  first 
ardour  of  zeal  had  cooled.  The  nap  was  gone,  and  the  threads 
had  become  exposed.  Their  self-inflicted  obligations  and  morti- 
fications were  more  onerous  than  they  could  endure  in  the 
long  run.  The  severe  fasts,  the  incessant  prayer,  the  ecstatic 
spiritual  exaltation  were  what  flesh  and  blood  could  not  con- 
tinuously support.  Aeroplanes  cannot  always  remain  above 
the  clouds,  they  must  come  down  to  earth  at  some  time.  These 
men,  when  they  began  to  realize  that  they  could  not  maintain 
themselves  at  the  high  spiritual  elevation  to  which  they  had 
mounted,  looked  out  for  a  convenient  place  to  which  to  descend, 
and  found  it  in  Rome.  They  caught  at  an  easy  method  of 
starting  afresh  on  a  lower  plane  in  another  Communion. 

Now  conceive  the  temptation  to  a  man  who  has  lived  on 
badly  cooked  meat,  tough  beefsteak,  much  cheese  and  swipes, 
to  abandon  all  this,  and  by  a  change  of  religion  to  be  able  to 
dine  at  Frascati's  and  go  to  a  music-hall. 

That  the  desire  for  emancipation  from  burdensome  obliga- 
tions and  high  spiritual  tension  was  a  cause  of  some  secessions 
could  not  be  doubted  when  one  observed  the  much  lower 


SECESSIONS 


321 


spiritual  tone  acquired  by  those  who  had  "  'verted."  I  recall 
a  case  some  while  ago  when  a  clergyman  who  had  been  a  zealous 
worker  for  God  was  seen,  a  few  weeks  after  his  reception  into  the 
Roman  Church,  sauntering  on  the  esplanade  in  a  shooting-coat, 
check  pants,  a  coloured  tie,  and  a  cigar  in  his  mouth,  ostenta- 
tiously flaunting  his  freedom  in  the  face  of  his  former  congre- 
gation as  they  were  leaving  church.  This  was  an  extreme  and 
exceptional  instance  of  bad  taste,  but  "  'verts  "  were  rather 
proud  of  extolling  the  easy  time  they  had  since  their  seces- 
sion. It  was  by  no  means  rare  that  such  as  "  went  over  " 
were  not  improved  morally  or  spiritually  by  their  change. 

Converts  have  very  generally  an  ostentatious  way  about  them 
of  obtruding  their  change  upon  our  notice,  much  as  little  boys 
straddle  and  display  their  legs  when  first  breeched. 

The  Rev.  E.  S.  Ffoulkes,  himself  a  "  'vert,"  wrote  in  1868  : 
"  What  people  say  of  those  generally  who  have  become  Roman 
Catholics  in  England  of  late  years,  is  that  they  have  deteriorated 
as  a  body  rather  than  advanced.  The  foremost  of  them  have 
not  progressed  in  any  perceptible  degree — perceptible,  that  is, 
to  others — beyond  the  high  standard  which  they  had  attained 
before.  .  .  .  Others,  every  allowance  being  made  for  the  peculiar 
trials  to  which  they  have  been  subjected,  have  notoriously 
descended  to  a  lower  level  of  Christianity  since  they  became 
Roman  Catholics,  from  that  in  which  they  had  been  working 
previously  ;  and  some  have  been  driven  from  their  moorings — 
in  appearance  at  least — altogether."  1 

From  a  distance  the  Roman  Church  exercises  a  great  fascina- 
tion over  some.  It  is  like  the  loadstone  mountain  in  the  voyage 
of  Sindbad,  that  attracts  to  it  ships  that  have  in  them  iron  nails, 
only,  alas !  to  draw  out  the  rivets  and  wreck  the  vessel.  And 
these  nails  are  the  vigorous  principles,  the  strong  sense  of  honour 
and  value  for  truth  that  were  in  them  when  in  the  English  Com- 
munion— all  too  often  extracted,  and  the  moral  nature  left  to 
go  to  pieces. 

Those  who  have  seceded  often  find  speedy  disillusioning. 
Many  then  remain,  sadly  looking  back,  afraid  of  the  gibes  they 
would  encounter  if  they  were  to  retrace  their  steps. 

It  was  precisely  those  who,  from  their  early  training,  never 
had  realized  the  Church  as  a  living  reality,  that  lost  their  balance 
and  began  the  Roman  secession.  These  early  converts  went, 
thinking  that  it  was  all  up  with  the  Anglican  Communion.  With 

1  The  Church's  Creed  and  the  Crown's  Creed  (1868). 

21 


322 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


what  amazement  must  such  have  watched  the  advance  made 
all  along  the  line  by  the  Church  of  England  since  they  abandoned 
her !  In  not  a  few  cases  there  has  ensued  an  aching  of  heart, 
and  a  longing  to  be  back  in  the  lap  of  their  mother.  I  knew 
the  case  of  a  vicar  in  London  who  had  seceded.  Years  after, 
when  he  thought  he  would  be  unobserved,  he  stole  back  to 
his  abandoned  parish  church,  and  there,  kneeling,  burst  into 
uncontrollable  sobs  and  tears. 

Out  of  the  number  who  at  one  time  left  the  Anglican  priest- 
hood for  that  of  Rome,  what  a  small  percentage  has  made  a 
mark  in  the  Church  of  their  adoption  !  Newman  and  Manning 
indeed  became  Cardinals,  Faber  and  "  Ideal  "  Ward  obtained 
some  eminence,  and  perhaps  there  may  have  been  a  few  more. 
But,  pace  Mrs.  Gossett,  a  turned  carpet  is  never  as  good  as  one 
that  is  new. 

On  the  other  hand,  consider  those  Dissenting  ministers  who 
have  been  received  into  the  Church  and  have  been  ordained — 
how,  almost  invariably,  they  have  been  not  only  themselves 
spiritually  raised,  but  have  become  a  power  in  the  Anglican 
Communion. 

One  thing  that  is  felt  by  many  and  leads  them  to  Rome  is 
the  lack  of  an  authoritative  voice  in  the  Church  of  England,  and 
this  is  what  they  can  obtain  in  that  of  Rome.  It  is  supposed 
that  our  Communion  lacks  a  feature  of  capital  importance, 
which  is  emphasized  strongly  in  the  other.  The  doubtful  cry 
out  for  guidance  in  the  problems  of  life,  for  a  hand  to  help  them 
among  the  complexities  of  the  twentieth  century.  They  say, 
"  Old  moorings  are  broken.  Sanctions  which  had  been  un- 
questioned for  centuries  are  being  set  aside.  There  are  alarm  and 
confusion,  and  many  are  crying  out  for  a  living  Ecclesia  docens. 
The  wilderness  seems  getting  darker  and  more  perilous,  and  the 
sheep  look  for  guidance.  They  must  have  a  living  voice.  It  is 
of  little  use  referring  them  to  the  Apostolic  age,  or  to  the  Church 
of  the  first  six  centuries,  or  to  the  united  voice  of  East  and  West 
before  the  schism,  or  even  to  the  voice  of  the  Western  Church 
before  the  catastrophes  of  the  sixteenth  century.  All  these 
affected  other  times,  other  circumstances  ;  we  want  a  voice 
that  will  speak  to  us  now,  and  will  help  us  in  the  difficulties  of 
the  twentieth  century.    Can  the  Church  of  England  do  this  ? 

But  before  adopting  the  Papacy  as  a  guide  to  be  trusted, 
before  accepting  the  voice  of  the  Pope  as  authoritative,  there 
are  certain  points  to  be  considered: 


SECESSIONS 


323 


(1)  Whether  Christ  gave  to  S.  Peter  the  prerogative  of  infalli- 
bility as  authorized  exponent  of  the  truth,  and  supremacy  as  well. 

(2)  Whether  S.  Peter  founded  the  Church  of  Rome,  and  if  so 
whether  he  was  authorized  to  transmit  his  supremacy  and 
infallibility  to  his  successors. 

(3)  Whether,  when  the  voice  has  been  used  authoritatively, 
it  has  always  proved  reliable. 

I.  The  Papacy  relies  practically  for  its  religious  sanction 
on  one  special  passage  :  "  Thou  art  Peter,  and  upon  this  rock 
I  will  build  My  Church  .  .  .  and  I  will  give  unto  thee  the  keys 
of  the  kingdom  of  heaven  :  and  whatsoever  thou  shalt  bind 
on  earth  shall  be  bound  in  heaven  :  and  whatsoever  thou  shalt 
loose  on  earth  shall  be  loosed  in  heaven  "  (Matt.  xvi.  18,  19). 
This  was  not  a  grant,  but  the  promise  of  a  future  grant.  The 
same  promise  was  made  to  all  the  Apostles  (xviii.  18),  and  the 
promise  was  fulfilled  after  the  Resurrection,  when  the  same 
power  was  granted  to  all  the  Apostles  equally  (John  xx.  22,  23). 
The  other  Gospels  beside  S.  Matthew's  record  the  fall  of  Peter, 
but  only  that  of  S.  Matthew  the  saying  about  the  Rock.  Had 
this  involved  a  doctrine  of  first  importance,  it  would  surely 
have  been  recorded  in  the  other  three.  If  this  saying  were 
the  giving  to  Peter  and  his  successors  a  primatial  authority, 
with  infallibility  and  supremacy,  then  we  may  conclude  that 
what  follows  soon  after — "  Get  thee  behind  Me,  Satan  :  thou 
art  an  offence  unto  Me  :  for  thou  savourest  not  the  things  that 
be  of  God,  but  those  that  be  of  men  " — applied  not  to  him  only, 
but  to  the  successors  of  Peter  as  well. 

The  words  of  Christ  as  to  Peter  and  the  Rock  would  never 
have  conveyed  to  the  believing  Hebrews  the  idea  that  it  con- 
stituted Peter  supreme  over  the  Church.1  Wherever  in  the  Old 
Testament  the  work  Rock  is  spiritually  used  to  denote  the 
basis  and  strength  of  the  Hebrew  Church,  or  the  refuge  of 
believers,  it  invariably  means  none  save  God  Himself,  and  it  has 
the  same  signification  in  the  New  Testament  in  other  passages 
where  used.2 

The  Creed  of  Pope  Pius  IV,  binding  on  all  Romanists,  requires 
this  :  "  Neither  will  I  take  and  interpret  them  (the  Scriptures) 
otherwise  than  according  to  the  unanimous  consent  of  the 

1  All  ancient  authorities  on  the  subject  are  agreed  that  the  original 
Matthew's  Gospel  was  written  in  Aramaic,  and  only  later — perhaps  about 
a.d.  100 — translated  into  Greek. 

2  See  "Legal  Evidence  of  Scripture  on  the  Petrine  Claims"  {Church 
Quarterly,  vol.  xi.  38). 


324 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Fathers."  This  cuts  away  the  received  Roman  interpretation 
of  Tu  es  Petrus,  etc.,  for  the  Fathers  were  by  no  means  unani- 
mous in  so  interpreting  the  passage.  Twenty-four  of  them 
make  the  Rock  to  be  the  Faith  Peter  professed.  Sixteen  make 
Christ  Himself  the  Rock,  eight  make  the  Church  to  be  founded 
equally  on  all  the  Apostles ;  and  although  seventeen  do  under- 
stand the  text  as  applying  to  Peter,  it  is  as  starting  the 
gathering  into  the  Church  of  Jew  and  Gentile  by  his  preaching 
(Acts  ii.  and  x.).  Consequently  Romanists  are  precluded  from 
relying  on  this  text. 

Had  the  Church  looked  to  S.  Peter  and  his  successors  as  the 
authorized  exponents  of  the  Truth,  there  would  have  been  no 
need  for  (Ecumenical  Councils.  Whenever  doubt  arose,  prelates 
would  have  appealed  direct  to  the  Apostolic  See  and  not  have 
met  to  debate. 

II.  Again,  we  have  sufficient  evidence  that  S.  Peter  as  well 
as  S.  Paul  died  a  martyr's  death  at  Rome  ;  but  evidence  that  he 
founded  the  Church  there,  as  he  did  that  at  Antioch,is  far  from 
certain.  It  is  possible  that  he  may  have  preached  to  the  Jewish 
converts  and  organized  them  into  a  community — if  so,  it  was 
a  Church  that  dwindled  and  finally  disappeared.1  That  he  did 
found  the  Church  at  Antioch  we  know  from  tradition,2  and 
might  have  expected,  had  Peter  possessed  the  prerogative  of 
infallibility  and  the  power  of  transmitting  it  to  his  successors, 
that  the  Patriarchs  of  Antioch  would  have  spoken  with  authori- 
tative voice.  Supposing  that  S.  Peter  did  found  the  Church 
of  Rome,  why  should  his  successor  there  arrogate  to  himself  a 
privilege  to  which  the  successors  of  the  Apostle  at  Antioch  had 
as  just  a  claim  ? 

One  would  have  supposed  that  the  Church  of  Antioch,  instead 
of  becoming  notorious  for  its  lapses  into  heresy,  would  have 
maintained  its  orthodoxy  unshaken,  as  founded  on  the  Rock 
of  Peter.  As  it  did  not,  we  have  no  guarantee  that  the  Church 
of  Rome,  supposing  it  to  have  been  based  on  Peter,  should  be 
the  infallible  exponent  of  the  truth. 

1  S.  Epiphanius  tells  us  that  there  was  this  double  origin  of  the  Roman 
Church,  and  so  only  can  be  solved  the  confusion  that  exists  as  to  the  suc- 
cession of  the  Bishops  of  Rome  in  the  early  period  :  some  authorities  make 
Linus  the  first  after  the  Apostle,  and  others  make  Clement  first.  Irenaeus 
puts  Clement  in  the  third  place,  with  Anencletus  or  Anacletus  as  his 
predecessor. 

2  S.  John  Chrysostom  speaks  in  glowing  terms  of  S.  Peter,  but  as  the 
founder  of  the  Church  of  Antioch.  Rome,  he  says,  may  have  his  body, 
but  we  Antiochenes  possess  his  faith. 


SECESSIONS 


325 


As  a  matter  of  fact  all  we  learn  from  the  Epistles  is  that 
the  Roman  Church  was  founded  by  S.  Paul  among  the  Gentiles, 
and  that  Church  grew  and  lived,  whereas  we  find  that  the  Judaeo- 
Christian  community  died.  It  was  to  the  Church  in  Rome  that 
S.  Paul  addressed  his  apostolic  Epistle,  and  from  the  Epistles 
of  S.  Paul  we  learn  nothing  about  Peter,  save  the  interesting 
fact  that  he  always  travelled  about  with  his  wife,  and  that, 
whilst  Paul  arrogated  to  himself  "  the  care  of  all  the  Churches," 
he  limits  Peter's  province  to  the  "  Apostleship  of  the  Circum- 
cision "  (Gal.  ii.  8).  "  So  ordain  I  in  all  the  Churches,"  said 
S.  Paul.  How  could  he  have  said  that,  had  Peter  been  supreme  ? 
How  could  S.  James  have  presided  at  the  first  Council  of  Jeru- 
salem instead  of  S.  Peter  ?  How  could  S.  Paul  have  rebuked 
S.  Peter  for  harking  back  at  Antioch  to  Jewish  tradition,  had 
Peter  been  supreme  ?  The  testimony  of  Scripture  is  dead  against 
the  claims  of  the  Papacy.  Irenseus  (d.  c.  202)  and  Clement 
of  Alexandria  (d.  c.  217)  state  that  Peter  and  Paul  preached 
together  at  Rome,  and  founded  the  Church  there.  Caius  the 
Priest  (c.  200)  refers  to  the  trophies  of  the  Apostles,  meaning 
their  tombs,  near  the  city,  and  adds  that  these  two  established 
the  Roman  Church.  Such  are  the  only  early  testimonies.  Had 
it  been  a  matter  of  faith  that  the  Roman  See  was  founded  by 
S.  Peter,  and  was  to  be  supreme,  assuredly  we  should  have 
been  furnished  with  proper  evidence  to  that  effect,  as  by  the 
M  Acts  of  the  Apostles  "  carrying  on  the  story  to  the  appearance 
of  Peter  in  Rome,  and  to  his  apostleship  there. 

As  to  evidence  that  S.  Peter  was  commissioned  and  empowered 
to  transmit  to  his  successors  the  authority  to  proclaim  what  was 
de  fide  and  what  was  not — there  is  none  whatever. 

Repeated  statement  does  not  make  a  statement  true.  We 
desire  evidence — and  we  are  given  none.  Persistent  assevera- 
tion convinces  only  such  as  have  not  the  minds  or  the  leisure 
for  examining  whether  the  assertion  be  warranted  or  the  con- 
trary. "  The  lady  (the  Roman  Catholic  Church)  doth  protest 
too  much,  methinks." 

With  the  Church  through  the  Middle  Ages,  the  Pope  has  played 
the  part  of  Petruccio  with  Katherine,  breaking  the  spirit  till 
she  repeats  all  that  he  says,  and  has  no  will  of  her  own  : 

Forward,  I  pray,  since  we  be  come  so  far, 
And  be  it  moon  or  sun  or  what  you  please  ; 
And  if  you  please  to  call  it  a  rush  candle, 
Henceforth  I  vow  it  shall  be  so  for  me. 


326 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


"  They  have  no  support  in  the  Fathers,  sir :  in  the  first 
three  centuries,  not  one  word."  Thus  spoke  Dr.  Routh,  by  far 
the  most  learned  divine  of  the  early  Tractarian  period,  con- 
cerning the  Ultramontane  claims. 

The  doctrine  of  S.  Peter's  apostleship  in  Rome  and  the 
foundation  there  of  the  Church  by  him  rests  on  the  Clementine 
fabrication.  The  Recognitions  and  the  Homilies  were  an  early 
Ebionite-Christian  romance,  having  no  foundation  in  fact. 
Clement  is  represented  as  a  young  Gentile  heathen,  who  hears 
and  follows  S.  Peter.  The  Apostle  is  disputing  with  Simon 
Magus,  who,  when  overcome  in  argument,  flies  from  place  to 
place,  and  is  pursued  by  S.  Peter,  till  at  last  the  Apostle  con- 
founds him  in  Rome.  When  Simon  was  attempting  to  fly, 
Peter  prayed ;  he  fell  and  was  killed.  Along  with  this  is 
woven  the  story  that  is  found  in  the  Menoechmi  of  Plautus, 
which  has  been  rendered  for  the  English  stage  in  the  Comedy 
of  Errors.  The  Clementines,  as  we  have  them,  are  not  in  their 
primitive  form,  they  are  based  on  an  earlier  romance,  The  Circuits 
of  Peter.  To  one  or  more  of  the  Clementines  is  prefixed  a 
spurious  epistle  purporting  to  have  been  addressed  by  Clement 
to  S.  James,  Bishop  of  Jerusalem,  after  the  death  of  S.  Peter, 
describing  how  Peter  had  consecrated  him  (Clement)  to  be  his 
successor  as  Bishop  of  Rome  ;  the  Apostle  is  said  therein  to 
have  laid  his  hands  on  Clement,  and  compelled  him  "  to  sit 
in  his  (Peter's)  chair."  The  original  of  the  Clementines  appeared 
probably  in  the  second  century,  and  on  it  is  based  mainly,  and 
out  of  it  grew,  the  fable  of  the  Petrine  origin  of  the  See  of  Rome.1 

We  might  have  supposed  that  the  Roman  catacombs  would 
have  yielded  some  evidence  referable  to  S.  Peter  as  founder  of 
the  Church  there.  Among  the  remains  in  those  of  the  first  two 
centuries  there  is  nothing.  It  is  not  till  we  reach  the  fourth, 
when  the  Clementine  romance  had  become  known  and  popular, 
and  was  generally  believed  as  true  history,  that  traces  of  Peter 
appear. 

In  419  Papal  legates  to  the  Church  of  Carthage  claimed  for 
Zosimus,  Pope  of  Rome,  appellate  jurisdiction,  on  the  ground 
that  it  had  been  accorded  to  the  successors  of  S.  Peter  by  the 
Council  of  Nicsea.  The  Carthaginian  Bishops  were  surprised. 
They  could  find  no  trace  of  such  a  canon  in  the  copies  they 
possessed  of  the  decrees  of  that  (Ecumenical  Council,  and  when 

1  Pullen  (F.  M.),  The  Primitive  Saints  and  the  See  of  Rome  (1900),  pp. 
41-9  ;  Bright  (W.),  The  Roman  See  and  the  Early  Church  (1896),  pp.  12,  13. 


SECESSIONS 


327 


they  applied  to  the  Churches  of  Alexandria  and  Constantinople, 
they  ascertained  that  neither  in  their  collections  was  such  a  canon 
to  be  found.  It  then  appeared  that  the  canon  in  question  was 
supposed  to  have  been  passed  in  the  Council  of  Sardica,  343, 
which  was  never  reckoned  as  (Ecumenical,  and  which,  even 
if  genuine,  made  Julius  of  Rome  personally  the  referee.  Sus- 
picion exists  that  the  canon  is  not  genuine.  Yet  it  was  quoted 
as  a  canon  of  Nicaea  by  other  Popes — Boniface  I  and  Ccelestine  I, 
and  by  Innocent  I ;  and  Leo  I  in  449  again  alleged  that 
the  Council  of  Nicaea  had  passed  this  canon.  Now  there  is 
preserved,  in  a  copy  of  the  canons  at  Rome,  the  very  one  from 
which  Innocent  quoted,  and  in  this  particular  canon  the  name 
of  Silvester,  who  was  contemporary  with  the  Nicaean  Council,  is 
fraudulently  given  in  place  of  Julius.  Zonaras  in  his  Annals, 
1 1 18,  speaks  of  this  trick  of  quoting  the  canon  of  Sardica  as  of 
Nicaea  as  a  common  practice  of  Rome:  "  The  Bishops  of  Rome 
falsely  say  that  this  is  the  canon  of  the  first  General  Council 
of  Nicaea."  1  The  appellate  jurisdiction  of  the  Papacy  actually 
rests  on  a  decree  of  Valentinian  III,  in  a  rescript  addressed  to 
jEtius,  commander-in-chief  in  Gaul,  dictated,  there  can  exist  no 
reasonable  doubt,  by  Pope  Leo  I,  in  446.  It  simply  swarms 
with  falsehoods.  "  It  is  impossible  to  lay  too  much  stress  on 
this  nefarious  transaction,  which  was  the  true  beginning  of 
the  Papal  usurpation  over  the  Church,  which  fitly  appears  as  the 
result  of  no  divine  grant,  but  of  the  reckless  edict  of  a  dissolute 
secular  tyrant,  who  closed  his  infamous  career  with  murder,  by 
his  own  hand  and  sword,  of  the  illustrious  general  ^Etius  (the 
very  person  to  whom  the  above  rescript  was  addressed),  and 
with  the  violation  of  a  noble  Roman  matron,  decoyed  to  his 
palace  by  a  fraud,  whose  husband  avenged  his  wrong  by  shedding 
the  ravisher's  blood.  This  edict  of  Valentinian  III,  not  the  speech 
of  Christ  to  Peter  uttered  at  Caesarea  Philippi,  is  the  charter 
of  the  modern  Papacy."2 

But,  as  may  well  be  supposed,  the  Papacy  little  relished  having 
to  allow  that  its  authority  reposed  on  so  scandalous  a  basis. 
Accordingly  the  questionable  Canon  of  Sardica  was  followed 
by  a  whole  series  of  fabrications.  Epistles,  decrees,  attributed 
to  many  Popes,  from  the  days  of  S.  Peter  downwards,  were 

1  Hussey  (R.)»  The  Rise  of  the  Papal  Power  (1851),  pp.  47-52. 

2  "The  Dawn  of  the  Papal  Monarchy"  (Church  Quarterly  Review, 
xxiii.  199)  ;  see  also  Pullen,  The  Primitive  Saints  and  the  See  of  Rome 
(1900),  pp.  200-2. 


328 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


systematically  forged  and  passed  off  as  genuine  on  the  unsus- 
picious Western  Church. 

Beginning  with  the  fictions  in  the  Liber  Pontificalis  down  to 
530,  "  a  calculated  forgery,"  there  ensued  the  False  Decretals, 
by  the  Pseudo- Isidore,  compiled  at  the  beginning  of  the  ninth 
century  (about  868  or  869).  Pope  Nicolas  I  met  the  doubts 
of  the  Frank  Bishops  as  to  their  genuineness  with  the  assur- 
ance that  the  Roman  Church  had  long  preserved  all  these 
documents  in  her  archives  with  honour  j  and  this  was  a 
deliberate  lie,  for  the  compilation  had  but  recently  been  made 
and  put  into  his  hands.1  It  would  be  difficult  to  find,  in  all 
history,  a  second  instance  of  so  successful  and  yet  so  clumsy  a 
forgery.  It  revolutionized  the  constitution  of  the  Western  Church. 
Then  came  Gregory  VII,  surrounded  by  a  gang  of  forgers,  or 
collectors  of  spurious  writings,  Anselm  of  Lucca,  Gregory  of 
Pa  via,  Deusdedit,  and  others  who  set  themselves  to  build  up 
and  amplify  the  work  of  the  false  Isidore.  When  in  the  sixteenth 
century  the  fact  of  the  Decretals  being  a  fabrication  was  estab- 
lished by  critics,  their  books  were  put  on  the  Index,  and  a 
Cardinal's  hat  was  conferred  on  the  Spaniard  Aguirre  in  reward 
for  his  attempt — the  last  ever  made — to  rehabilitate  the  pseudo- 
Isidore  in  1682.  A  century  later,  in  1789,  Pius  VI  was  compelled 
to  admit  that  the  collection  was  a  fabrication.  Based  on  the 
forged  Decretals,  falsified  canons  of  genuine  councils,  and  in- 
vented canons  of  councils  that  never  existed,  Gratian,  in  the 
middle  of  the  twelfth  century,  compiled  his  Decretum.2  No  book 
ever  came  near  it  in  its  influence  in  the  Church ;  it  served  to 
stereotype  the  revolution  that  had  been  effected  in  the  con- 
stitution of  the  Catholic  Church  in  the  West.  Like  the  succes- 
sive courses  in  a  building,  one  laid  on  and  covering  another,  so 
layer  after  layer  of  forgeries  and  falsifications  formed  the  sub- 

1  The  letter  of  Pope  Nicolas  I,  under  date  869,  may  be  read  in  Baronius, 
Ann.  Eccl.  xii.-xv.  He  had  previously  affirmed  the  authenticity  of  these 
forgeries  in  a  letter  to  the  Patriarch  Photius  {ibid.  xv.).  Forgery  was, 
in  fact,  practised  as  a  fine  art  by  Churchmen  in  the  Middle  Ages.  Few 
abbeys  were  without  sophisticated  charters.  See  Howorth  (Sir  H.), 
Augustine  the  Missionary  (191 3,  pp.  xxxvi  et  seq.),  for  numerous  instances 
in  England.    See  the  example  set  by  Rome : 

In  order  to  obtain  from  King  Pepin  territorial  sovereignty  in  Italy, 
a  Donation  from  Constantine  to  Pope  Silvester  was  forged,  on  the 
strength  of  which  the  sovereignty  was  claimed,  not  as  a  grant,  but  as  a 
restitution.  The  success  of  this  piece  of  iniquity  encouraged  to  later 
falsifications. 

2  The  Decretum  of  Gratian  quotes  324  times  epistles  of  the  early  Popes. 
Of  these  3 1 3  are  from  spurious  letters,  and  of  the  remaining  11  it  is 
not  certain  that  they  are  genuine. 


SECESSIONS 


329 


stance  of  the  Papal  claims  and  gave  them  their  worthless 
authority. 

Then  followed  the  issue  of  a  catena  of  spurious  quotations 
from  Greek  Fathers  and  councils,  fabricated  in  the  thirteenth 
century  by  a  Latin  theologian,  a  Dominican,  it  is  supposed, 
who  had  long  lived  in  the  East.  This  catena  deceived  S.  Thomas 
Aquinas,  who  unsuspectingly  embodied  it  in  his  Theology,  and 
since  then  these  quotations  have  been  accepted  as  genuine 
and  quoted  repeatedly  as  genuine — yet  forged  they  were,  and 
now  are  grudgingly  acknowledged  as  such. 

The  Popes  have  been  apologized  for  in  acting  upon  these 
spurious  decrees,  and  taking  advantage  of  them  for  the  building 
up  of  their  power,  on  the  plea  that  they  themselves  did  not 
fabricate  them  j  but,  as  Dr.  Salmon  has  pointed  out,  the  case 
is  much  the  same  as  that  of  a  man  who  has  not  himself  forged 
a  cheque,  but  who  presents  one  that  has  been  forged  by  some  one 
else,  and  pockets  the  money. 

With  respect  to  the  New  Testament  texts  quoted  by  Roman 
apologists,  a  signification  is  put  upon  them  that  was  not  thought 
of  by  the  Early  Church,  and  such  quotations  as  they  produce 
have  to  be  verified  and  the  context  studied  before  accepting 
them.  It  was  a  custom  among  Cornish  mining  captains,  when 
a  widely  advertised  lode  was  visited  by  prospective  investors, 
to  "  salt  the  mine,"  that  is  to  say,  to  blast  sufficient  tin  ore 
into  the  sterile  rock  to  make  it  appear  rich  and  inspire  con- 
fidence in  the  visitors.  In  like  manner,  Ultramontane  writers 
have  dealt  with  Scripture  and  the  Fathers.  They  have  blasted 
into  them  that  which  was  never  originally  present  there. 

No  fact  is  more  strongly  established  than  that  the  whole 
Papal  claim  to  supremacy  and  infallibility  is  based  on  a  fiction 
and  built  up  piecemeal  with  profligate  mendacity. 

III.  We  have  next  to  consider  whether  the  authoritative 
voice  of  the  Pope  has  always  proved  reliable.  Innocent  III 
sent  a  horde  of  the  scum  of  Europe  against  the  Albigenses  to 
massacre,  rob,  and  outrage  these  poor,  ignorant  people,  because 
they  would  not  be  converted  by  his  missionaries  ;  and  he 
promised  them  heaven  as  their  reward.  They  acted  on  his 
exhortations,  and  committed  frightful  atrocities,  turning  the 
fair  fields  of  Provence  into  a  shambles. 

Did  not  Julius  II,  by  Bull  dated  October  2,  1507,  throw  the 
cloak  of  infallibility  over  that  preposterous  fraud,  the  Holy 
House  of  Loretto  ?    And  on  the  grounds  that  this  house  was 


330 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


translated  by  angel  hands  from  Bethlehem  to  Loretto,  Bulls 
were  granted  to  confirm  its  privileges  by  Leo  X,  Adrian  VI, 
and  Clement  VII.  Thousands  and  tens  of  thousands  of  pilgrims 
visit  Loretto  to  obtain  the  indulgences  accorded  to  them  on  so 
doing,  and  they  go  relying  on  the  authority  of  the  Papacy. 

Did  not  Leo  XIII  authorize  a  proper  office  and  mass  in  honour 
of  the  Lourdes  apparition,  babbling  ungrammatical  nonsense  ? 
And  did  not  Pius  X,  on  November  13,  1907,  extend  the  festival 
of  this  apparition  as  obligatory  on  the  whole  Church,  to  be 
observed  on  February  11  ? 

At  few  times  did  the  calumniated  more  need  a  protecting 
hand  extended  over  them,  and  the  Western  world  more  require 
an  authoritative  voice  controlling  and  instructing,  than  in  the 
fifteenth  century,  when  the  mad  fear  of  witchcraft  fell  on  the 
people.  And  how  did  the  Papacy  utter  its  authoritative  voice  ? 
On  December  5,  1484,  Pope  Innocent  VIII  issued  a  Bull  Summis 
desiderantes  that  encouraged  and  systematized  the  judicial 
murders  of  poor  ignorant  women  and  men  charged  with  witch- 
craft, and  inaugurated  a  reign  of  terror  which  invaded  every 
country  of  Europe  where  the  voice  of  the  Pope  was  heard,  left 
whole  principalities  mere  smoking  places  of  execution,  and 
decimated  their  inhabitants. 

Pope  Leo  X,  in  his  bull  Exsurge  in  1520,  condemned  as 
pestiferous  and  heretical  the  declaration  of  Luther  "  that  to 
burn  heretics  is  against  the  will  of  the  Holy  Spirit."  By  this 
Roman  Catholics  are  bound. 

On  May  27,  1632,  Galileo  was  condemned,  and  his  doctrine 
pronounced  to  be  heretical,  because  he  showed  that  the  world 
moved  round  the  sun. 

In  1704,  the  Sacred  Congregation  of  the  Inquisition  decided 

that  the  Orders  in  the  Abyssinian  Church  were  valid,  where  the 

Archbishop  ordains  only  when  some  eight  to  ten  thousand 

candidates  have  been  assembled.    They  stand  in  rows,  and  he 

walks  up  and  down  in  front  of  them,  imposes  his  hand  on  each, 

and  says  :  "  Receive  the  Holy  Ghost  !  "    Nothing  more.  But 

in  the  case  of  English  Orders  the  Pope  pronounced  them  invalid 

through  deficiency  of  form  and  intent.    In  1875  an  awkward 

attempt  was  made  to  wriggle  out  of  this  contradiction.1  It 

1  Church  Quarterly  Review  (1878),  p.  276.  Here  is  another  case: 
Sixtus  V  undertook  to  provide  a  version  of  S.  Jerome's  Latin  Bible  that 
should  be  authentic.  "  His  Bull  declared  that  this  edition,  corrected  by 
his  own  hand,  must  be  received  and  used  by  everybody  as  the  only  true 
and  genuine  one,  under  pain  of  excommunication  ;  every  change,  even  of 


SECESSIONS 


331 


must  be  remembered  that  the  Congregation  of  the  Inquisition 
is  the  official  organ  of  the  Pope  in  all  matters  connected  with 
the  Faith. 

Then  again,  in  the  domain  of  morals,  is  the  Pope  a  sure 
guide  ?  It  is  not  difficult  to  test  such  a  claim.  On  September  6, 
1816,  Alfonso  Liguori  was  canonized  by  Pope  Gregory  XVI, 
and  on  March  23,  1871,  Pius  IX  raised  him  to  the  dignity  of  a 
Doctor  of  the  Church,  on  a  level  with  S.  Augustine  and  S. 
Gregory,  on  account  of  the  value  of  his  Moral  Theology,  and 
now  this  work  of  Liguori  is  the  accredited  guide  to  Confessors 
in  dealing  with  souls.  His  system  is  one  that  destroys  all  sense 
of  truth,  and  raises  equivocation  to  a  fine  art.  I  can  but  give 
one  specimen.  He  teaches  that  if  an  adulteress  be  asked  by  her 
husband  whether  she  has  been  faithless,  she  is  justified  in 
answering  that  she  has  not,  for  she  can  affirm  she  has  not  broken 
the  marriage  tie,  for  that  bond  in  the  eye  of  the  Church  is 
indissoluble  j  or  again,  if  after  her  transgression  she  has  been 
to  Confession  and  been  absolved,  she  may  deny  that  she  is 
guilty,  because  her  guilt  has  been  purged  by  Absolution ;  or, 
thirdly,  if  charged  with  adultery,  she  may  repudiate  it  by 
giving  to  the  term  its  metaphorical,  Biblical  sense  of  idolatry. 

Is  it  to  be  wondered  at  that  among  Romanists,  as  compared 
with  Protestants,  the  standard  of  truthfulness  is  low  ?  The 
morality  of  any  religious  body  may  be  measured  by  the  authorized 
pronouncements  of  its  teachers,  and  by  the  practical  results  of 
their  teaching.  If  a  hydrangea  produce  blue  flowers  instead  of 
pink,  you  know  that  it  has  been  watered  with  liquid  impregnated 
with  iron  rust.  You  do  not  gather  grapes  of  thorns,  or  figs  of 
thistles  ;  and  if  a  tree  is  known  by  its  fruit,  so  also  is  a  Church. 
We  have  but  to  look  at  the  lands  and  peoples  where  Romanism 
is  the  general  religion,  and  test  the  results.  Is  the  condition  of 
morality  and  the  appreciation  of  truth  in  Spain,  Italy,  France, 
Mexico,  South  America,  higher  than  in  Protestant  lands  ?  Are 

a  single  word,  being  forbidden  under  anathema.  But  it  soon  appeared 
that  it  was  full  of  blunders,  some  two  thousand  of  which  had  been  intro- 
duced by  the  Pope  himself.  Bellarmine  advised  that  the  peril  Sixtus 
had  brought  the  Church  into  should  be  hushed  up  as  far  as  possible,  all 
the  copies  were  to  be  called  in,  and  the  corrected  Bible  printed  anew, 
under  the  name  of  Urban  VII,  with  a  statement  in  the  Preface  that  the 
errors  had  crept  in  through  the  fault  of  the  compositor.  Bellarmine  himself 
was  commissioned  to  give  circulation  to  these  lies,  to  which  the  Pope  gave 
his  name,  by  composing  the  Preface."  (Janus,  The  Pope  and  the  Council 
(1869),  p.  62.)  Sixtus  had  brought  himself  under  his  own  sentence  of 
anathema  and  excommunication  by  issuing  the  revised  edition. 


332 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


the  gentry  and  the  peasantry  there  purer  in  life,  more  honest 
in  their  dealings,  less  murderous,  less  licentious  than  the  corre- 
sponding classes  in  England  ? 

If  we  cannot  trust  the  voice  of  the  Pope  in  matters  of  morality, 
what  guarantee  have  we  that  it  can  be  trusted  in  matters  of 
faith  ? 

As  for  those  who  clamour  for  an  infallible  guide,  and  expect 
to  find  one  in  the  Pope,  how,  one  may  ask,  is  it  that  not  till 
Boniface  VIII,  in  1303,  was  any  decree  of  a  Pope  addressed  to 
the  Universal  Church  ?  The  gift,  if  ever  possessed,  lay  dormant 
when  most  needed,  in  the  great  conflicts  of  the  Faith  at  the  time 
of  the  Arian  domination,  for  instance,  when  Athanasius  took 
the  lead,  and  Liberius,  the  Pope,  fell.  For  over  a  thousand 
years  the  voice  that  should  have  guided  Christendom  was 
silent. 

In  the  next  place,  are  we  to  be  babes  all  our  days,  needing 
a  nurse's  hand  to  prevent  us  from  stumbling  ?  The  voice  of 
the  Church  is  clear  enough  in  all  things  necessary  for  salvation 
as  to  what  to  believe  and  what  to  do.  The  great  facts  pro- 
claimed in  the  Creeds  and  the  divine  institution  of  the  Sacra- 
ments suffice.  They  are  firm  enough.  Beyond  them  is  a  tract 
on  which  v/e  are  allowed  freedom  to  walk,  and  must  exercise 
our  judgment  as  to  where  to  go  and  how  to  walk.  There  are 
problems  in  life  we  must  work  out  for  ourselves,  and  not  hand 
them  over  to  a  master  to  solve  for  us,  as  a  dull  boy,  too  inert  to 
work  out  a  sum,  passes  over  his  slate  to  the  schoolmaster. 

Reason  is  given  to  man  to  be  exercised  and  not  to  be  atrophied. 
The  Church  of  Rome  confines  us  within  stone  walls,  in  which  is 
not  a  gate  through  which  we  can  look  out  into  the  open  country. 

There  are,  however,  persons  who  love  to  be  helpless,  and  to 
be  directed  as  to  what  they  shall  read,  how  they  shall  think, 
what  they  shall  hear,  what  they  shall  see  and  taste  and  smell. 
Such  persons  will  always  take  happily  to  the  nursery  of  the 
Roman  Church  ;  it  saves  so  much  trouble  not  to  have  to  think 
for  oneself,  to  have  one's  mind  made  up  for  one. 

There  will  always  be  those  who  look  over  their  shoulders  at 
the  past,  and  who  idealize  what  has  been  and  disparage  what 
is.  They  see  the  past  in  a  haze  of  splendour ;  they  have  never 
looked  below  this  mirage  and  seen  what  really  was.  Such 
will  be  inclined  to  go  to  Rome,  fancying  that  it  was  what 
actually  it  never  was.  But  the  genuine  Churchman  looks  the 
present  in  the  face  and  has  an  eye  to  the  future. 


SECESSIONS 


333 


The  first  danger  that  the  Christian  Church  encountered  was 
from  those  who  harked  back  to  the  more  ornate  and  highly 
articulated  Judaic  Church.  The  Christian  Church  was  in  pro- 
cess of  organization  and  development,  and  the  Jewish  converts 
reverted  with  a  sigh  to  the  more  strict  and  narrow  regulations 
of  the  Mosaic  rule,  that  bade  them  touch  not,  taste  not,  handle 
not.  They  craved  for  limitations,  they  desired  to  be  ever  in 
a  strait  waistcoat.  The  future  is  not  with  such.  They  are 
with  the  dead.  It  is  not  the  strong  natures  that  are  ever  look- 
ing backwards.  The  past  appeals  less  to  the  understanding 
than  to  an  unintelligent  sentiment.  This  inclination  is  based 
rather  on  the  perceptible  shortcomings  of  the  new  than  on  the 
fancied  merits  of  the  old,  which  merits,  with  a  little  study  of 
history,  would  be  dissipated. 

As  Jeremy  Taylor  wisely  said  in  a  sermon  preached  before 
the  University  of  Dublin,  "  Let  us  go  to  God  for  Truth  ;  for 
Truth  comes  from  God  only,  and  His  ways  are  plain,  and  His 
sayings  are  true,  and  His  promises  Yea  and  Amen  ;  and  if  we 
miss  the  Truth,  it  is  because  we  will  not  find  it ;  for  certain  it  is, 
that  all  that  Truth  which  God  hath  made  necessarie,  He  hath  also 
made  legible  and  plain,  and  if  we  will  open  our  eyes,  we  shall 
see  the  sun,  and  if  we  will  walk  in  the  light,  we  shall  rejoice  in 
the  light.  Every  man  must,  in  his  station,  do  that  portion 
of  duty  which  God  requires  of  him,  and  then  he  shall  be  taught 
of  God  all  that  is  fit  for  him  to  learn  :  there  is  no  other  way  for 
him  but  this." 

The  Romanists  may  say  of  the  Church  of  England  that  it  is 
a  City  of  Confusion,  but  it  is  not  so.  On  all  essentials  we  are 
one.  The  Universal  Church  herself  has  been  a  city  of  confusion 
at  several  epochs  of  her  career.  That  there  are  among  us  those 
whose  faith  is  feeble,  and  who  deny  the  verities  of  the  Catholic 
religion,  is  true  of  every  age,  is  true  of  the  modern  Roman  Church 
as  well,  only  in  it  every  effort  is  made  to  hush  up  or  "  fire  out  " 
those  who  do  not  submit  unintelligibly  and  without  exercise  of 
their  reason  to  matters  outside  the  great  verities  of  the  Faith. 
Throughout  Catholic  Europe  there  is  surging  up  a  tide  of  revolt 
against  the  Vatican  and  all  its  proceedings.  Men  desire  to  get 
out  of  the  atmosphere  of  the  nursery  into  the  pure  air  of 
heaven,  and  to  look  up  to  the  blue  vault  above,  and  not  to  the 
depressing  dome  of  S.  Peter's  ;  to  eat  solid  food  and  not  to  be 
condemned  to  draw  their  nutriment  out  of  feeding-bottles. 

Another  reason  for  "  'verting"  has  been  that  some  clergy, 


334 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


through  special  circumstances,  have  found  it  impossible  to  continue 
useful  in  the  sphere  in  which  they  were.  One  had  a  wife  whose 
example  counteracted  his  teaching  ;  another  had  contracted 
debts  at  the  University  which  he  could  not  hope  to  discharge 
as  a  curate,  being  without  interest,  and  with  no  prospect  of  an 
incumbency.  He  trusted  that  he  might  be  able  to  clear  off  his 
liabilities  in  a  clerkship,  or,  by  disappearance,  evade  his  creditors 
altogether.  A  third  had  quarrelled  with  his  leading  parishioners, 
and  in  place  of  recognizing  that  the  fault  lay  in  his  own  want 
of  tact  or  temper,  flying  into  a  tiff  against  the  English  Church, 
deserted  her.    In  a  word,  his  secession  was  due  to  galled  vanity. 

There  are  some  women  and  not  conspicuously  virile  men 
who  delight  in  tinsel  and  paper  flowers,  and  do  not  concern 
themselves  to  look  behind  the  frippery  for  the  ends  of  twine  and 
twisted  wire  ;  persons  who  care  mainly  for  what  is  outside,  and 
regard  as  less  material  that  which  is  within.  Highly  coloured 
sweets  are  not  invariably  wholesome.  Larded  veal  is  more 
palatable,  but  not  more  nutritious,  than  plain  roast.  Such 
persons  as  those  mentioned  repudiate  the  latter,  because  their 
soul  lusts  after  the  strips  of  bacon.  Such  are  attracted  to  Rome 
by  its  gorgeous  ceremonial  and  ritual  elaborations,  and  will 
gulp  down  any  amount  of  superstitious  abuses  without  making 
wry  faces.  Paulus  Jovius,  who  wrote  the  life  of  his  patron, 
Leo  X,  tells  us  that  this  Pope  was  wont  to  serve  his  guests  at 
table  with  flesh  of  monkeys  and  other  unclean  beasts,  highly 
spiced,  and  when  those  who  had  partaken  of  these  meats  com- 
mended their  excellence,  he  chuckled  over  their  credulity. 

But,  on  the  other  hand,  there  be  earnest  souls  that  have 
been  brought  up  in  a  nebulous  religion  without  definite  teach- 
ing, who  crave  for  distinct,  dogmatic  truths  that  they  can  lay 
hold  of,  and  without  which  they  languish  j  when  these  secede, 
if  it  be  from  the  Anglican  Communion,  it  is  due  to  the  neglect 
or  ignorance  of  their  clergy  who  ought  to  have  given  bread,  but 
instead  supplied  gruel.  But,  as  far  as  my  experience  goes,  it 
is  not  from  the  Church — at  all  events,  not  from  such  as  have  been 
brought  up  in  Church  principles — that  Rome  gains  her  converts, 
but  from  Dissent  and  Evangelicals.  And  it  is  for  this  reason 
that  the  Romans  look  with  a  peculiarly  jealous  eye  on  the 
Catholic  party  in  the  English  Church.  Souls  must  have  definite 
truths  to  grapple.  Standard  roses  will  not  thrive  in  a  light 
soil.  They  must  have  something  solid  that  their  roots  may 
grip.    Samuel  Wilberforce,  when  Archdeacon,  told  the  Earl  of 


SECESSIONS 


335 


Carlisle  that  the  fact  of  Dr.  Arnold  having  "  no  defined  system 
on  religious  subjects  "  conduced  to  his  pupils  becoming  Trac- 
tarians.    He  might  have  added,  Romanists  also. 

Adjoining  one  of  our  most  popular  watering-places  is  a 
parish  that  was  rapidly  being  covered,  in  the  first  half  of  the 
last  century,  with  villa  residences.  The  squire  was  a  strong 
Evangelical,  and  he  greatly  disliked  the  Anglicanism  of  the  vicar 
and  the  mild  ritual  of  the  services.  When  it  came  to  chanting 
the  Psalms  he  abandoned  his  parish  church,  and  drove  down 
every  Sunday  to  an  extremely  Low  church  in  the  town.  But 
after  half  a  year's  experience  of  that,  he  could  endure  it  no 
longer,  with  the  continuous  denunciations  of  Rome  as  Babylon  ; 
and  by  way  of  curiosity  he  went  to  the  Roman  chapel  to  see 
for  himself  what  Popery  was.  He  was  so  struck  and  fascinated 
by  what  he  saw  and  heard  that  he  was  converted  and  received. 
Then  he  set  to  work  and  built  a  convent  for  Sisters  and  a 
Roman  Catholic  church  on  his  property. 

Now,  so  long  as  in  the  parish  church  the  services  were  of  a 
stiff  Anglican  character,  a  great  many  of  the  young  people  of 
both  sexes  would  go  to  the  Roman  chapel,  mainly  for  Vespers 
and  Benediction,  being  attracted  by  the  beauty  and  the  poetry 
of  the  same  ;  and  several  were  by  this  means  lost  to  the  Anglican 
Communion.  But,  after  a  while,  at  the  parish  church,  full 
Catholic  ritual  was  adopted,  and  distinct  and  emphatic  teaching 
of  the  Faith.  Since  then  the  young  folk  have  ceased  to  go  to 
the  Roman  chapel,  or,  if  they  go,  it  is  to  draw  comparisons,  and 
say,  "We  have  more  beautiful,  more  solemn,  and  better  con- 
ducted services  in  our  parish  church." 

As  may  well  be  supposed,  there  is  no  love  entertained  for 
the  latter  by  the  members  of  the  Latin  Communion. 

As  said  elsewhere,  Manning  had  been  brought  up  as  an 
Evangelical  as  truly  as  had  Newman.  The  same  may  be  said 
of  other  notable  seceders,  Sibthorp,  Ryder,  Simeon,  Dodsworth, 
Hope-Scott,  Dikes,  Noel,  Faber,  etc.  The  three  sons  of  Mr. 
Wilberforce  who  "  'verted  "  came  from  the  purest  Evangelical 
source.  "  These  men  drew  scores,  nay  hundreds,  in  their  train, 
and  of  all  the  leaders  it  must  be  said  that,  as  they  proceeded 
from  Oxford  (so  to  speak)  to  Rome,  so  they  had  already 
marched  from  Clapham  to  Oxford." 

As  already  said,  conviction  generally  jumps  with  inclination. 
Conviction  is  much  like  the  divining-rod,  that  turns  and  points 
in  the  direction  a  man  wishes  and  expects  it  to  indicate.  The 


336 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Dowser  really  believes  in  the  apparatus,  is  quite  honest  in  pur- 
pose. The  action  of  the  muscles  on  the  hazel  twig  is  uncon- 
scious, but  not  involuntary.  And  the  individual  who  is  pre- 
disposed to  join  the  Church  of  Rome,  or  Esoteric  Buddhism,  or 
Mormonism,  will  discover  cogent  reasons  impelling  his  con- 
science to  pursue  the  course  to  which  his  inclinations  lead. 

"  Out  of  these  Convertites,"  said  Jaques,  "  there  is  much 
matter  to  be  heard  and  learnt." 

We  have  among  our  clergy  a  certain  number  of  priests  who 
are  Roman  in  their  sympathies.  Whatever  is  Roman  is  good, 
whatever  is  English  is  bad.  Happily,  they  are  few,  and  have 
very  little  influence.  If  they  go  over  to  Rome,  they  are  no  loss 
to  us,  and  they  are  no  gain  to  Rome. 

Because  lazy  French  people  and  priests  sit  for  the  Psalms, 
some  of  those  most  affected  by  foreign  novelties  ostentatiously 
decline  to  rise  to  their  feet  when  the  Psalms  are  said  or  sung. 
I  have  known  cases  where  the  choir  have  been  forbidden  to  turn 
to  the  East  at  the  Creed,  because  this  is  an  English  and  not  a 
Roman  custom. 

We  lost  a  good  deal  at  the  Reformation  that  we  have  reason 
to  regret  ;  we  lost  more  during  the  dead  time  of  the  Hanoverian 
obsession.  But  it  is  one  thing  to  endeavour  to  recover  or  to 
revive  what  is  good,  old,  and  wholesome,  that  has  been  let 
slide,  and  another  thing  to  introduce  novelties  that  have 
nothing  to  recommend  them  but  that  they  are  un-English. 

Probably  the  principal  reason  why  Dissent  gained  such  a 
hold  on  the  uneducated,  especially  in  country  places,  is  that 
the  Prayer  Book  was  unintelligible  to  them.  Anciently  the 
Mass  they  could  grasp,  though  in  Latin,  as  an  act  of  worship. 
But  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer  was  not  common  except  among 
those  who  could  read.  The  service  in  the  meeting-house  was 
level  with  their  comprehension.  This  inability  to  understand  it 
is  passing  away,  but  we  still  need  simplification  and  not  elabora- 
tion. We  should  gauge  the  capacity  of  our  congregations,  pre- 
cisely as  a  farmer  tests  the  soil  of  his  fields  before  he  resolves 
what  his  crops  shall  be. 

The  Catholic  Faith  in  its  simplicity  will  always  command 
the  belief  of  devout  souls  ;  and  Catholic  worship  appeals  to 
the  heart.  According  to  Duchesne,  the  highest  liturgical 
authority,  Matins  and  Vespers  were  originally  family  prayers 
among  the  early  Christians,  then,  along  with  the  other  Hours, 
were  adopted  by  the  monks,  and  when  cathedral  chapters  were 


SECESSIONS 


337 


formed,  passed  on  to  them,  and  from  them  finally  to  parish 
churches.  But  the  Holy  Eucharist,  as  the  one  service  of  divine 
institution  and  of  apostolic  appointment,  was  the  service  of 
Christendom,  and  is  so  still  everywhere  in  Catholic  and  Oriental 
Christendom.  We  got  into  the  way  of  substituting  what  was 
supplementary  for  that  which  was  essential.1 

But  the  Eucharist  should  be  rendered  dignified  and  simple. 
Over -elaboration  of  ritual  was  all  very  well  for  mediaevals,  but 
it  does  not  commend  itself  to  English  people  of  the  present 
day ;  still,  less  do  all  the  fancy  functions  that  Rome  has 
formulated. 

It  is  a  significant  fact  that  where  there  has  been  a  secession 
of  clergy  to  Rome  from  a  large  town  Church,  the  number  of 
lay-folk  who  have  followed  has  been  insignificant ;  nay,  further, 
the  relief  from  the  presence  of  unfaithful  guides  has  acted 
sensibly,  the  Church  has  gained  in  vigour,  increased  the  number 
of  communicants,  and  has  had  larger  offertories. 

If  we  remain  staunch  to  the  Church  of  England  and  its  formu- 
laries, I  have  no  hesitation  in  saying  that  we  shall  carry  the 
people  along  with  us  ;  but  if  we  adopt  strange  and  unintelligible 
rites  we  shall  repel  them. 

The  foreign  plants  introduced  into  England  that  have  rooted 
and  spread  have  now  become  English  plants.  The  foreign 
settlers  who  have  come  among  us,  in  the  second  generation,  have 
become  Englishmen.  But  we  English  people  will  never  become 
Italians  in  our  religion — such  is  foreign  to  our  blood,  to  our 
instincts,  to  our  traditions. 

I  once  wanted  to  plant  rhododendrons  on  limestone  rock. 
My  gardener  said  to  me :  "  You  don't  feed  an  'oss  on  veal 
cutlet,  and  you  don't  give  a  cat  beans.  You  must  give  'em  not 
what  you  fancy,  but  what  they  likes.  And  rhododendrons  won't 
thrive  on  lime."  And  so — Romanism  may  seed  itself  on  English 
soil,  but  will  never  thrive  in  free  English  air  and  flourish  on 
English  soil.  It  will  draw  out,  maybe,  a  sickly  existence  for  a 
time,  and  then  finally  perish.    As  Virgil  says : 

Cura  sit 

Et  quid  quaeque  ferat  regio,  et  quid  quaeque  recuset. 


1  The  rubric,  "  Then  shall  the  priest  say  to  them  that  come  to  re- 
ceive," was  objected  to  by  Bucer  as  acknowledging  non-communicating 
attendance,  and  he  vainly  endeavoured  to  get  it  expunged.  In  1559 
an  abortive  attempt  was  made  to  introduce  a  dismissal  of  non-communi- 
cants after  the  offertory. 


22 


CHAPTER  XV 


PROGRESS 

AS  has  been  already  intimated,  the  Tithe  Commutation  Act 
was  generally  welcomed  as  a  relief  by  both  clergy  and 
tithe-payers,  as  doing  away  with  much  friction.  Mr. 
Mozley  mentions  calling  on  an  incumbent  previous  to 
its  passing,  and  finding  that  his  parishioners  had  deserted  the 
church  and  built  for  themselves  a  large  meeting-house,  because 
he  had  claimed  some  disputed  tithe. 

But  there  was  another  grievance  besides  tithe  that  created 
ill-feeling,  and  that  was  the  imposition  of  Church  rates. 

' '  To  them  and  their  collection  a  determined  resistance  was 
offered.  It  began  in  an  attempt  to  diminish  the  amount  col- 
lected for  the  purpose  of  repairing  the  churches  and  providing 
the  things  that  were  required  for  the  due  and  decent  celebration 
of  divine  service  in  them.  But  the  opposition  to  them  was 
carried  further.  Payment  of  the  rate  being  deferred,  it  was 
enforced  by  seizure  of  goods  and  the  imprisonment  of  recusants. 
In  the  great  Braintree  case,  after  expensive  legislation  protracted 
over  many  years,  it  was  finally  determined,  on  appeal  after 
appeal,  that  a  rate  laid  by  a  minority  at  a  meeting  of  the 
parishioners  could  not  be  enforced.  In  Rochdale,  the  contest 
was  carried  to  such  a  pitch  that  upwards  of  13,000  votes  were 
recorded,  and  the  military  were  called  out  to  preserve  order. 

"  But  the  victorious  party,  although  they  had  expended 
large  sums  of  money  on  the  contest,  did  not  collect  a  single 
penny  of  the  rate  they  had  with  so  much  difficulty  succeeded  in 
laying.    It  had  become  evident  that  the  impost  was  not  worth 
the  trouble  and  expense  incurred  in  obtaining  it,  and  after  the 
two  defeats  mentioned  above,  it  was  gradually  expiring,  when 
Mr.  Gladstone's  Church  Rate  Bill  (i860)  virtually  abolished  it  "  1 
A  sore  was  removed  and  a  way  was  opened  for  voluntary 
contributions,  that  have  more  than  doubled  the  amount  extorted 
1  Molesworth,  History  of  the  Church  in  England  (1882),  p.  395. 
338 


PROGRESS 


339 


by  the  rate,  to  be  spent  on  the  sacred  edifices  and  the  services. 
I  will  now  give  a  few  examples  of  progress  such  as  I  have  noticed 
myself — not  that  there  is  in  them  anything  extraordinary,  but 
as  an  instance  of  how  the  Church  is  making  way,  and  the  level 
of  her  services  is  rising. 

I  do  not  think  that  a  more  marked  instance  of  progression 
can  be  found  than  in  Cornwall.  This,  as  I  remember  it,  was 
infected  with  all  kinds  of  Dissent.  It  was  in  the  diocese  of 
Exeter,  already  too  large  to  be  worked  effectively  by  a  single 
Bishop.  It.  was  separated  in  1876,  and  made  into  a  diocese  of 
Truro.  Cornwall  possesses  now  a  Bishop  of  its  own  and  a 
suffragan. 

At  present  there  are  two  bishops  in  the  Exeter  diocese,  so  that 
where  some  years  ago  there  was  but  one,  in  Devon  and  Cornwall, 
there  are  now  four  working,  and  working  hard.  Truro  possesses 
a  stately  cathedral,  the  first  after  S.  Paul's  reared  in  England 
since  the  Reformation.  When  Bishop  Benson  became  its  first 
head,  he  is  reported  to  have  said,  "  I  shall  find  more  difficulty 
with  the  clergy  than  with  the  people."  And  it  was  so.  A 
great  many  were  torpid,  inert,  because  hopeless,  and  some 
because  indifferent,  but  of  these  last  there  were  not  many.  I 
recall  going  as  a  boy  with  my  parents  to  Minster  Church,  near 
Boscastle,  of  a  morning  on  Sunday.  We  passed  meeting-houses 
in  which  were  many  people,  and  the  sound  of  hymnody  poured 
through  the  windows.  At  Minster  the  sole  congregation  was 
composed  of  our  family,  that  of  the  parson,  and  the  clerk  ;  and 
the  incumbent  preached  to  us  on  the  evidences  for  the  existence 
of  a  God. 

The  Cornish  are  an  emotional  people,  and  a  Catholic  service 
appeals  to  their  hearts,  a  stirring  sermon  they  especially  relish  ; 
and  where  both  are  provided  in  the  Church,  there  most  certainly 
congregations  gather  and  are  moulded  in  life,  feeling,  and 
practice.  Among  Dissenters  there  is  a  general  admission  that 
the  numbers  are  falling  off.  With  the  Cornish  people  I  do  not 
think  it  is,  as  elsewhere,  to  indifference,  but  that  they  are  being 
drawn  to  the  Church  ;  and  they  are  drawn  to  the  Church  because 
in  her  they  learn  what  it  is  to  love  God,  whereas  in  the  chapel 
they  are  roused  by  the  fear  of  God.  I  will  venture  to  quote 
Mr.  Hudson  : 

14  Last  year  one  day  a  Truro  acquaintance  of  mine  got  into 
a  railway  carriage  in  which  were  five  Methodist  ministers 
returning  from  a  conference  they  had  been  attending.  They 


340 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


were  discussing  the  decrease  of  the  number  of  converts  and  the 
decline  of  revivals  during  the  last  few  years.  One  of  them,  a 
stout,  elderly  person,  said  he  did  not  take  so  pessimistic  a  view 
as  the  others  appeared  to  do.  He  thought  the  falling  off,  if 
there  were  any,  was  perhaps  attributable  to  the  ministers  them- 
selves, and  then  added  :  '  All  I  have  got  to  do  is  to  preach  my 
Judgment  Day  sermon  to  set  them  howling.'  The  others  were 
silent  for  a  while,  and  then  one  said :  1  Do  you  think  it  wise 
to  say  much  about  everlasting  punishment  at  the  present 
juncture  ? '  No  one  replied  to  the  question,  and  after  an  un- 
comfortable interval  they  changed  the  subject."  1 

Then,  again,  at  the  present  day  the  sense  of  the  beautiful 
is  sedulously  cultivated.  Even  advertisements  must  now  be 
made  artistically  attractive.  Books  must  be  illustrated  with 
charming  pictures.  The  day  of  crude  colouring  and  bad  de- 
lineation is  past.  And  it  is  impossible  for  the  young  people 
not  to  draw  a  contrast  between  the  old  granite  parish  church, 
with  its  carved  screen,  its  radiant  altar,  the  beautiful  singing, 
and  the  tender  sermon,  with  their  Bethels  in  which  is  the  very 
cult  of  ugliness;  and  the  result  is  they  desert  these  latter  and 
flock  into  the  former. 

Again  I  will  quote  Mr.  Hudson,  for  he  is  impartial: 

"  'Any  house  is  good  enough  to  worship  God  in,'  is  a  treasured 
saying,  and  it  has  been  remarked  that  no  place  of  worship 
has  ever  been  raised  by  Nonconformity  in  England  which  any 
person  would  turn  aside  from  the  road  to  look  at.  This  would 
be  too  little  to  say  of  the  chapels  in  West  Cornwall,  where  the 
principle  of  any-house-good-enough  has  been  carried  to  an 
extreme.  These  naked  granite  boxes  set  up  in  every  hamlet 
and  at  roadsides,  hideous  to  look  at,  and  a  blot  and  disfigure- 
ment to  the  village  and  to  God's  earth,  are  assuredly  an  insult 
to  every  person  endowed  with  a  sense  of  beauty  and  fitness. 

"  The  interior  of  these  chapels  is  on  a  par  with  their  exterior 
appearance.  A  square,  naked  room,  its  four  dusty  walls  distem- 
pered a  crude  blue  or  red  or  yellow,  with  a  loud-ticking  kitchen 
clock  nailed  high  up  on  one  of  them  to  tell  how  the  time  goes. 
Of  the  service  I  can  only  say  that  after  a  good  deal  of  experience 
of  chapel  services  in  many  parts  of  England  I  have  found  nothing 
so  unutterably  repellent  as  the  services  here  .  .  .  the  intolerable 
sermon,  the  rude  singing,  the  prayers  of  the  man  who  with 
'  odious  familiarity '  buttonholes  the  Deity,  and  repeats  his 
1  Hudson  (W.  H.),  The  Land's  End  (London,  1908),  p.  199. 


PROGRESS 


341 


'  And  now,  O  Lord/  at  every  second  sentence — the  whole  squalid 
symbolism  !  "  1 

In  the  towns  it  is  otherwise:  there,  with  good  music,  with 
sensational  advertisements  and  florid  preaching,  every  effort 
is  made  to  keep  adherents  and  attract  outsiders.  The  Church 
has  a  serious  task  before  her  in  Cornwall.  If  Methodism  has 
stirred  religious  feeling,  it  has  failed  entirely  to  make  the  Cornish 
a  moral  people.  Both  Wales  and  Cornwall,  alike  hotbeds  of 
Dissent,  are  far  from  moral,  in  marked  contrast  to  the  Catholic 
Bretons,  who  are  of  absolutely  the  same  mixture  of  races. 

In  1912  there  were  190  churches  in  Cornwall  in  which  the  Holy 
Communion  was  celebrated  weekly,  and  51  fortnightly,  whereas 
in  40  it  was  monthly — where  the  fag-ends  of  old  usage  lingered 
on.    The  number  of  communicants  was  at  Easter  16,000. 

There  is  a  certain  living  in  the  West  of  England,  with  a  popu- 
lation of  a  thousand  and  a  half,  that  was  for  three  generations 
in  the  hands  of  one  family.  The  grandfather  was  the  first 
rector  of  this  set ;  then  came  his  son,  who  was  incumbent  for  fifty 
years  ;  lastly  the  grandson,  who  held  the  living  for  forty.  All 
three  neglected  their  duties,  and  set  by  no  means  a  high  standard 
of  life  before  the  people.  The  children  of  the  parish  were  left 
in  ignorance  of  the  simplest  Bible  stories.  In  a  word,  for  a 
hundred  and  twenty-five  years,  or  thereabouts,  the  place  remained 
in  practical  heathenism. 

The  few  decent  Churchmen  in  it  refused  to  communicate, 
because  the  communicants  were  notoriously  bad  characters. 
The  church  was  bepewed  and  had  a  three-decker.  The  altar 
was  a  deal  table  with  a  moth-eaten  red  cloth  on  it. 

Now  all  is  changed,  and  there  has  been  progress.  The  church 
has  been  cleared  of  pews,  the  chancel  cut  off  from  the  nave  by 
a  rood-screen;  a  well-appointed  altar  has  taken  the  place  of 
the  shabby  deal  table  ;  services  are  frequent,  Holy  Communion 
at  the  least  weekly,  and  the  children  are  regularly  catechized. 
With  every  year  the  roll  of  communicants  increases. 

The  adjoining  parish  to  mine,  Bridestowe,  had  formerly  Sourton 
annexed  to  it. 

In  the  church  there  were  but  two  services  on  Sunday,  and 
quarterly  Communion. 

In  1846  the  Rev.  Hinds  Howell  became  rector.  He  had  been 
curate-in-charge  of  Washfield  from  1833  to  1839,  when  there 
was  no  resident  rector.    With  a  population  of  500,  he  had  120 

1  Ibid.  pp.  201-3. 


342 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


regular  communicants.  I  know  the  church  well.  It  has  a 
magnificant  post- Reformation  carved  oak  screen,  and  till  recently 
— or  comparatively  recently — a  village  orchestra  performed  in 
the  services.  When  the  order  came  from  Bishop  Phillpotts  of 
Exeter  for  the  use  of  the  surplice  in  the  pulpit,  and  that  of  the 
Church  Militant  prayer,  a  storm  of  disapproval  broke  out. 
On  the  following  Wednesday,  being  Ash  Wednesday,  all  the 
farmers  of  the  parish,  with  the  exception  of  two,  absented  them- 
selves from  the  service,  which,  till  then,  they  had  always  attended. 
The  malcontents  pressed  Mr.  Howell  to  give  way ;  they  were 
met  by  a  resolute  refusal.  But  by  his  assiduity  in  visiting  the 
sick  amongst  those  who  had  rebelled,  he  broke  down  their 
prejudice.  The  ensuing  Good  Friday  and  Easter  Day  saw 
every  farmer,  with  the  members  of  his  family,  in  their  seats  in 
church.  At  the  annual  dinner,  given  on  Easter  Monday,  after 
the  parish  meeting,  the  farmer  who  had  led  the  opposition  first 
moved  that  Mr.  Howell  should  take  the  chair,  and  then  delivered 
himself  as  follows  :  "  Sir,  you  have  conquered  us.  We  did 
object  to  your  reading  the  prayer  for  the  Church  Militant  every 
Sunday,  and  to  your  public  christenings,  but  we  have  talked  it 
over,  and  we  have  come  to  the  conclusion  that  your  way  is  right ; 
and  now  not  one  of  us  will  go  against  you."  More  than  twenty 
years  later,  at  a  Church  Conference,  his  hand  was  grasped  by 
a  West  Country  Archdeacon,  who  said  :  "I  must  shake  your 
hand,  Mr.  Hinds  Howell.  How  you  helped  us  by  standing  firm 
on  the  surplice  question !  " 

The  surplice  riots  that  broke  out  in  Exeter  shook  the  iron 
nerve  of  Bishop  Phillpotts,  and  he  sent  for  Mr.  Howell,  showed 
him  a  letter  he  had  written,  and  asked  his  opinion  on  it.  After 
a  short  silence,  he  returned  the  letter  to  his  diocesan.  "  You  do 
not  tell  me  what  you  think  of  my  letter,"  said  the  Bishop. 
"  My  Lord,  I  would  rather  have  cut  off  my  right  hand  than 
written  it."  That  letter  abandoned  the  whole  position,  and 
left  the  wearing  of  the  surplice  to  the  option  of  the  clergy. 

This  was  the  man  who  in  1846  became  Rector  of  Bridestowe. 
He  was  staunchly  orthodox,  but  not  in  any  degree  a  ritualist. 

Indeed,  among  the  old  Tract arians  there  were  no  ritualists. 
They  conceived  it  their  duty  to  state  the  Faith,  to  proclaim 
the  mission  of  the  Church,  and  the  grace  in  the  Sacraments. 
Mr.  Howell's  views  had  been  largely  identical  with  those  of 
Bishop  Phillpotts,  and  to  these  he  remained  faithful  to  the  day 
of  his  death. 


PROGRESS 


343 


In  Bridestowe  he  soon  proved  a  power.  He  opened  his 
school  daily  at  nine  o'clock  with  prayer  and  a  Bible  lesson. 
After  teaching  in  the  school  he  visited  in  the  parish  ;  and  it 
was  one  teeming  with  dissent.  There  were  Baptists,  Wesley ans, 
and  Plymouth  Brethren.  With  the  former  he  acquired  so  much 
influence  that  before  long  he  had  baptized  every  one  of  their 
children  and  closed  their  chapel. 

With  Bridestowe  went  the  daughter  church  of  Sourton,  on 
the  edge  of  Dartmoor,  and  this,  which  was  in  a  dilapidated 
condition,  he  restored,  and  rebuilt  the  chancel. 

Mr.  Howell  rose  every  morning  at  five  o'clock,  and  as  soon 
as  his  family  came  down,  the  psalms  and  lessons  and  prayer 
for  the  day  were  gone  through,  after  which  came  breakfast.1 
In  1855  he  was  succeeded  in  the  Rectory  of  Bridestowe  by  Rev. 
Alexander  Watson,  previously  of  S.  Mary's  Church,  Torquay, 
where  he  had  raised  a  noble  chancel,  well  appointed,  but  was 
unable  to  rebuild  the  nave.  He  instituted  daily  choral  service. 
His  successor  "  restored  "  the  church  by  calling  to  his  aid  a 
common  builder,  who  put  up  ugly  deal  benches  in  place  of  the 
pews,  demolished  the  beautiful  carved-oak  screen,  with  its  painted 
post-Reformation  tympanum,  and  lined  the  chancel  with  yellow 
pitched  deal  boarding,  varnished,  making  it  look  like  a  ship's  cabin. 

In  1889  the  Rev.  J.  Loveday  Frances  became  rector,  and 
nearly  all  that  which  Alexander  Watson  had  instituted,  and 
which  had  been  allowed  to  lapse,  was  restored.  There  is  now 
daily  service  and  weekly  Celebration,  as  also  on  Saints'  and 
other  Holy  Days. 

At  Mary  Tavy  was  Antony  Buller  (1833-77):  Mr.  Mozley 
has  given  a  brief  notice  of  him  in  his  Reminiscences.  His  parish 
was  one  very  difficult  to  deal  with,  as  the  population  was  largely 
made  up  of  miners,  congregated  at  a  considerable  distance  from 
the  parish  church,  on  Black  Down.  Mr.  Buller  was  a  scholar — 
a  modest,  shy  man — and  one  of  more  force  was  needed  to  deal 
with  very  rough  men  and  their  equally  rough  wives  and 
children.  The  church  was  pewed  to  the  ears,  the  altar  was  a 
deal  table  covered  with  a  flowing  red  cloth.  He  had  daily 
service,  but  only  monthly  Communion,  and  the  number  of  com- 
municants, out  of  a  population  of  considerably  over  a  thousand, 
was  twenty.  Then  ensued  a  change,  and  now  the  church  has 
a  beautiful  screen  and  rood-loft,  a  high  altar,  a  side-altar  in  the 
Lady  Chapel,  and  a  daily  celebration. 

1  Hinds  Howell :  a  Memoir  (Norwich,  1899). 


344 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


The  parish  of  Bratton  Clovelly,  that  adjoins  mine  on  the  north, 
comprised  8,316  acres  ;  the  tithe  commutation  or  rent  charge 
was  fixed  at  £460,  and  there  is  a  glebe  of  159  acres.  From 
1822  to  1844  the  rector  was  a  Mr.  Birdwood,  and  the  story  is 
told  of  him  that  he  was  wont  to  visit  the  parish  twice  only  in 
the  year,  to  collect  his  tithes,  on  which  occasions  he  remained 
over  the  Sunday  and  always  preached  the  same  sermon  from 
the  same  text:  "Render  unto  Caesar  the  things  that  are 
Caesar's,  and  unto  God  the  things  that  be  God's  " — which  the 
parishioners  altered  into  :  "  and  unto  Birdwood  the  things  that 
be  God's." 

The  Rectory  originally  stood  near  the  church,  but  it  had 
been  burnt  down,  and  the  curate  was  put  to  live  in  a  small 
farmhouse  furnished  with  cob  walls,  on  the  glebe,  at  a  consider- 
able distance  from  the  church  and  village,  to  which  he  had 
to  ascend  150  feet  of  steep  hill,  by  a  road  that  in  winter  was 
sometimes  a  torrent  bed  and  at  others  a  sheet  of  ice. 

The  curate  who  served  the  church  under  Mr.  Birdwood  had 
quarterly  Celebrations.  Then  came  a  Mr.  Budge,  a  scholar  and 
able  man,  and  he  instituted  monthly  Eucharists.  When  the 
Rev.  E.  Seymour  succeeded  he  had  them  at  first  fortnightly, 
in  1833  they  became  weekly,  and  so  they  have  continued  since. 
The  altar  has  candles  and  vases,  and  a  reredos  of  carved  alabaster ; 
every  window  is  filled  with  stained  glass  ;  in  the  chancel  is  a 
surpliced  choir,  and  in  lieu  of  the  old  deal  pews  the  church  is 
fitted  throughout  with  richly  carved  oak  benches. 

At  Plymouth  both  S.  Andrew's  and  Charles  Church  are  in 
the  hands  of  very- Protestant  trustees.  At  S.  Andrew's  on 
"  Christening  Sunday  "  a  crowd  of  low  characters  was  wont  to 
gather  round  the  doors  of  the  church,  eagerly  offering  to  stand 
sponsors  in  return  for  sixpence  or  a  pint  of  beer.  The  church 
was  bepewed  and  was  furnished  with  a  three-decker.  Even 
in  S.  Andrew's  there  has  been  advance.  The  three-decker 
has  disappeared,  and  a  surpliced  choir  occupies  the  chancel, 
precisely  one  of  the  things  that  was  objected  to  as  Popish  at 
S.  Peter's.  Now  the  florid  musical  service  is  the  great  attrac- 
tion. As  the  supply  of  Evangelical  clergy  is  running  short  in 
England,  the  trustees  have  had  to  import  Irishmen  for  the  last 
two  incumbents. 

S.  Peter's,  as  already  related,  was  opened  in  November  1848. 
At  the  present  date  there  are  in  Plymouth  and  Devonport 
seven  churches  in  which  the  Eucharistic  vestments  are  worn, 


PROGRESS 


345 


and  lights  are  used  at  Holy  Communion.  In  five  incense  is 
burned. 

A  great  friend  of  our  family  was  the  Rev.  Christopher  Bartho- 
lomew, incumbent  of  S.  David's,  Exeter.  This  was  a  peculiarly 
ugly  church  in  debased  Italian  style,  with  a  tower  surmounted 
by  a  foolscap.  Internally  it  was  smothered  in  pews  and  choked 
with  galleries.  A  few  hard  free  seats  at  the  back  were  the 
sole  provision  made  for  the  poor  parishioners.  Christopher 
Bartholomew  altered  nothing  in  the  fittings  of  the  church,  used 
the  three-decker  to  the  end,  with  a  table  behind  it  in  flaming 
red  drapery  for  an  altar.  He  did,  however,  have  daily  prayer 
and  frequent  Communions.  He  taught  definite  doctrine,  and 
was  considered  an  able  preacher.  The  congregation  comprised 
fashionables  from  the  handsome  villa  residences  of  rich  merchant 
families,  but  also  from  the  country  came  carriages  with  liveried 
servants  on  the  box  and  heraldic  decorations  blazing  on  the 
harness,  that  deposited  county  families  at  the  church  gate,  driven 
in  to  hear  the  popular  preacher. 

Old  S.  David's  has  vanished  as  a  bad  dream,  and  its  place  is 
now  occupied  by  one  of  the  finest  and  most  skilfully  designed 
of  modern  churches.  It  is  larger  than  the  old  building,  and 
when  I  have  attended  it  has  been  crowded,  not  with  county  and 
merchant  families,  but  with  tradesfolk,  shopmen,  and  girls.  The 
altar  is  adorned  with  a  superb  reredos  of  carved  oak.  The 
service  is  fully  choral,  with  surpliced  choir  and  candles  burning 
on  the  altar.  But  that  is  not  all.  Out  of  S.  David's  has  grown 
a  second  parish,  that  of  S.  Michael,  with  another  fine  church 
and  a  tower  and  spire  that  are  an  ornament  to  the  city.  Here 
also  Divine  worship  is  conducted  much  as  in  the  mother  church, 
and  S.  Michael's  is  in  a  poor  district  and  is  the  church  of  the 
poor,  who  were  wont  in  old  days  to  be  thrust  away  at  the  back 
under  a  gallery  in  "  free  seats." 

In  the  cathedral,  in  which  there  was  formerly  but  a  monthly 
Celebration,  there  is  now  one  daily. 

At  S.  Sidwell's,  in  the  "  forties,"  the  Rev.  Edward  Harold 
Browne  was  rector.  He  introduced  daily  service  and  weekly 
celebration.  His  successor  was  Francis  Courtenay,  and  it  was 
under  him  that  the  storm  burst,  described  in  another  chapter, 
and  the  disturbances  continued  throughout  his  short  tenure 
(he  died  in  1849)  an(*  during  the  early  days  of  John  Lincoln 
Gait  on,  who  was  the  next  incumbent.  He  discontinued  the 
surplice  for  a  time,  but  continued  everything  else.    In  1870  he 


346 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


was  able  to  restore  the  church  with  the  addition  of  a  chancel, 
have  a  surpliced  choir  and  choral  services.  Since  then  lights 
have  been  used  at  all  celebrations,  also  the  singing  of  the  Bene- 
dictus  and  Agnus  Dei  at  the  choral  Celebration  has  been 
adopted,  and  Eucharistic  vestments. 

At  the  cathedral  lights  are  used  at  the  early  Celebration, 
also  at  S.  Stephen's  and  S.  Laurence's  and  S.  John's.  There  are 
lights  at  all  Celebrations  at  eight  parish  churches,  vestments 
worn  in  six,  vestments,  lights  and  incense  at  one. 

Now  let  us  turn  to  Cambridge,  that  has  ever  been  a  breeding- 
ground  of  Puritanism. 

When  I  was  there  as  an  undergraduate,  in  1853-7,  there  was 
but  one  church  in  the  town  in  which  was  a  weekly  Celebration, 
and  that  was  late.  This  church  was  S.  Giles,  a  curious  octagonal 
structure  with  the  seats  so  arranged  as  to  radiate  from  the 
pulpit  as  a  centre.  That  pulpit  was  a  huge  structure  with 
a  sounding-board  above  it,  and  the  acoustic  properties  were 
such  that  not  only  could  every  word  of  the  preacher  be  heard 
by  every  individual  in  the  congregation,  but  the  faintest  whispered 
remark  of  one  of  these  latter  was  audible  in  the  pulpit. 

The  incumbent  was  under  sentence  of  suspension  for  three 
years  by  Turton,  Bishop  of  Ely,  because  he  had  refused  to  read 
the  Burial  Service  over  a  notoriously  bad  character  in  the  parish 
who,  when  drunk,  had  fallen  into  the  Cam  and  been  drowned. 

Mr.  Dodd,  the  vicar,  sat  in  a  pew  in  cassock  and  gown,  and 
the  curate  celebrated  in  surplice  and  funereal  stole.  No  other 
ritual  than  what  was  then  general  was  observed.  The  altar 
was  muffled  in  white  linen,  and  the  chalice,  paten,  and  wine- 
jug  were,  if  I  remember  rightly,  on  the  altar,  not  on  a  credence, 
and  were  covered  with  a  napkin.  Such  undergraduates  as 
desired  to  make  their  weekly  Communion  used  to  go  to  the 
church,  and  wait  outside  till  the  sermon  was  over,  and  the 
non-communicants  trooped  out  at  12  o'clock.  This  hideous 
church  was  demolished  in  1870,  and  the  present  S.  Giles's 
Church  was  built.  On  the  other  side  of  the  street  has  been 
erected  a  stately  new  church,  S.  Peter's,  and  the  two — S.  Giles's 
and  S.  Peter's — are  served  by  one  vicar  with  three  curates. 
There  is  a  daily  celebration  of  the  Holy  Eucharist  at  7.30  a.m. 
at  S.  Peter's,  and  daily  also  at  S.  Giles's,  at  7.45  a.m.  There  is 
at  least  one  weekly  Celebration  in  seven  other  churches  in  Cam- 
bridge ;  in  all,  there  are  five  in  which  the  lights  and  vestments 
are  in  use. 


PROGRESS 


347 


Twenty-five  years  ago  there  were  but  two  churches  in  Liver- 
pool in  which  vestments  were  worn ;  there  are  now  eleven. 
And  this  means  far  more  than  ritual  advance,  it  signifies  advance 
as  well  in  definite  Church  teaching. 

The  Church  revival  in  England  has  passed  through  three 
marked  phases  or  stages  that  must  not  be  overlooked. 

The  appeal  made  by  the  Tractarians,  for  a  restoration  of 
doctrine  forgotten  or  in  abeyance,  was  made  to  the  ears  of 
scholars  and  clerics,  and  to  men  and  women  of  culture  generally, 
and  it  reached  and  influenced  them .  Scott 's  novels  had  awakened 
an  interest  in  what  was  mediaeval ;  and  there  was  a  revulsion 
against  the  debased  taste  in  architecture  everywhere  manifest, 
and  a  desire  to  recur  to  the  purer  types  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
But  this  was  among  the  noble  and  gentle  and  refined  alone. 
And  it  was  among  the  noble  and  cultured  that  the  Tracts 
met  with  ready  reception.  This  generation  passed  away.  The 
sons  and  grandsons  did  not  care  to  tread  in  the  footsteps  of 
their  forebears  :  they  were  animated  with  other  enthusiasms, 
if  not  too  blase  to  have  any  at  all ;  some  were  immersed  in 
politics,  others  in  pleasure,  went  with  their  rifles  stalking  tigers, 
or  with  butterfly  nets  pursuing  American  heiresses.  I  can  recall 
how,  in  the  first  period,  so  many  spiritual  faces  were  to  be  seen — 
faces  of  men  and  women  that  seemed  to  see  God  j  such  as  I 
have  noticed  nowhere  else,  save  in  convents  and  monasteries, 
and  among  the  Brittany  peasants  and  peasantesses.  I  do  not 
see  quite  so  many  of  these  now. 

As  Walter  Pater  says  in  Marius  the  Epicurean,  the  beauty 
of  their  faith  was  irradiated  in  the  faces  of  the  Christians,  "  as 
if  some  profound  correction  and  regeneration  of  the  body  by 
the  Spirit  had  been  begun  and  already  gone  a  great  way ;  the 
countenances  of  these  men,  women,  and  children  had  a  bright- 
ness upon  them  which  he  could  fancy  reflected  upon  himself." 
Pater  in  these  words  described  what  he  saw  in  the  faces  of  the 
old  Tractarians  ;  faces  still  to  be  seen  among  saintly  Romanists, 
and  among  ourselves. 

The  movement  presently  entered  on  a  second  stage.  Hitherto 
the  middle  classes  had  been  wholly  given  over  as  a  prey  to  the 
teeth  of  Dissent,  but  now  the  Oxford  Movement  began  to  affect 
them.  It  was  like  the  descent  of  the  angel  into  the  pool  of 
Bethesda  to  trouble  the  waters  and  make  them  wholesome  and 
healing.  Men  who  had  been  formal  Churchmen  became  such 
now  by  conviction,  because  they  had  learned  what  the  Church 


348 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


was :  the  kingdom  of  God  on  earth,  not  a  mere  State  creation. 
Many  who  had  been  bred  in  the  negations  and  emotionalism 
of  Nonconformity  came  over  to  the  Church  and  embraced 
Catholic  teaching  with  avidity.  Others  craved  for  a  broader 
outlook  and  a  freer  air  than  they  could  gain  in  Evangelicalism. 

The  Evangelicals  had  had  their  day  and  had  not  known 
how  to  use  it.  Almost  all  benefices  and  positions  of  authority 
that  the  State  could  give  had  been  shovelled  out  to  them,  as 
a  banker  shovels  out  gold.  They  had  laboured  as  individuals 
to  advance  personal  religion,  without  any  concerted  plan  of 
action.  They  met  and  shouted  in  Exeter  Hall,  they  denounced 
High  doctrine  and  practice  in  shrill  cries  from  their  pulpits. 
The  bishops  of  this  faction  started  up  like  the  leather-topped 
hammers  of  a  piano,  twanged  a  string,  dropped  out  of  sight, 
and  the  note  they  had  sounded  died  away  without  an  echo. 

And  now  came  the  third  phase. 

In  Yorkshire  and  in  the  East  of  London,  and  in  places  that 
appeared  most  unpromising,  the  High  Church  clergy  cast  them- 
selves amidst  a  teeming  artisan  population,  among  mill-hands, 
colliers,  dock  labourers.  Since  then  this  field  has  been  specially 
their  own.  Wherever  there  were  men  and  women  earning  their 
bread  with  the  sweat  of  their  brow,  there  zealous,  enthusiastic 
Church  men  and  women  are  to  be  found. 

The  movement  has  not  by  any  means  captured  the  class,  any 
more  than  as  a  whole  it  has  mastered  the  middle  class,  but 
it  has  effected  a  breach  in  the  walls  of  ignorance  and  prejudice, 
and  every  year  shows  progress.  As  to  the  upper  class — the 
nobility,  the  gentry,  the  plutocrats — they  are  pretty  well  left  to 
stew  in  their  own  fat,  to  ride  their  polo  ponies,  play  bridge, 
race  over  the  country  on  Sundays  in  their  motors,  and  eat  and 
drink  of  the  best.  It  is  with  the  shopkeeper  and  the  operative 
that  the  Church  will  do  most. 

Mr.  Robert  Lowe,  when  the  franchise  was  extended,  said : 
"  Now  we  must  teach  our  masters."  The  future  of  England — 
of  the  Empire — is  in  the  hands  of  the  working  man:  he  has 
a  vote  as  well  as  the  squire,  the  factory  hand  as  well  as  his 
employer.  The  future  of  the  English  branch  of  the  Catholic 
Church  depends  now,  and  will  depend  to  an  increasing  degree, 
on  the  horny  and  begrimed  hands  of  ploughmen  and  artisans, 
and  into  these  the  Church  must  commit  her  cause,  will  she  nill 
she.  It  is  the  working  man  who  will  be  called  on  to  decide 
whether  she  is  to  be  cast  forth  naked,  despoiled,  disinherited ; 


PROGRESS 


349 


whether  she  is  to  be  accorded  full  liberty  to  control  her  own 
actions,  direct  her  own  course ;  or  whether  she  is  to  be  further 
crippled  and  manacled.  There  must  be  no  blinking  of  facts. 
The  power  to  decide  her  future  resides  in  these  scarred  but 
stout  and  iron  hands,  and  the  work  set  before  the  Church  is 
to  Christianize,  to  cleanse,  to  direct  aright  the  masters  of  the 
future. 

On  Saturday  afternoon,  June  21,  1913,  was  held  in  London  a 
demonstration,  by  nearly  a  thousand  parishes  of  the  metropolis 
and  its  suburbs,  against  the  Disendowment,  Disestablishment, 
and  Disruption  of  the  Welsh  Church.  There  were  sixteen 
processions  from  divers  quarters  of  London  converging  on  Hyde 
Park.  I  was  down  on  the  Embankment  to  see  the  gathering 
and  march-past  of  the  contingent  from  the  East  of  London,  of 
poor  clerks,  dock  labourers,  seamstresses,  artisans,  and  factory 
hands.  Each  parish  was  preceded  by  its  banner,  and  each  was 
provided  with  scrolls  inscribed  with  significant  sentences,  as 
n  S.  George  stands  by  S.  David,"  "  Fight  for  the  Faith,"  "  For 
God  and  the  Church."  Those  forming  the  procession  walked 
some  four,  some  eight  abreast,  and  took  an  hour  in  passing. 
As  they  moved  on  they  sang  "  The  Church's  one  foundation," 
"  O  God,  our  help  in  ages  past,"  "  Onward,  Christian  soldiers," 
etc.  There  was  no  mistaking  the  fact  that  these  demonstrators 
belonged  to  the  labouring  class,  that  they  were  in  thorough 
earnest.  It  was  variously  computed  that  in  Hyde  Park  they 
numbered  from  120,000  to  150,000. 

What  this  great  gathering  of  the  clans  revealed  to  me,  and 
to  many  others,  was  the  great  progress  the  Church  had  made 
in  the  affections  of  the  people.  Could  such  a  demonstration 
have  been  attempted  fifty  years  ago  ?    I  trow  not. 

Nor  was  this  all :  similar  processions  for  the  same  purpose  had 
been  organized  all  over  England  ;  at  Leeds  from  8,000  to  10,000 
men,  and  men  only,  walked  in  the  procession  ;  at  Plymouth 
there  was  at  the  smallest  computation  30,000  ;  in  Nottingham 
they  numbered  11,000  ;  there  were  at  Swansea  20,850  in  proces- 
sion. One  thing  shown  by  this  demonstration  was  the  fact 
that  the  Church  of  England  was  a  living  force,  and  that  it  had 
taken  deep  and  enduring  root  in  the  hearts  of  tens  of  thousands 
everywhere,  and  especially  in  those  of  the  working  class,  men 
and  women. 

Rene  Bazin,  in  his  touching  story  Le  Ble  qui  leve,  has  shown 
how  that  in  France,  notwithstanding  the  repeated  mowing  down 


350 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


of  the  Church,  religion  being  trampled  under  foot,  buried  and 
smothered  under  layers  of  Materialism  and  Socialism,  the  blade 
of  Faith  is  beginning  to  show  above  the  surface.  This  is  true 
as  well  of  England.  Gilbert  Cloquet,  in  Bazin's  story,  after 
long  godless  years  of  friendlessness,  desertion,  disappointment, 
at  the  age  of  fifty  recovers  his  faith.  Kneeling  up  in  his  bed 
he  tries  to  pray,  but  has  forgotten  the  words  of  prayer.  Only 
he  recalls  how  once,  as  a  little  lad,  when  his  mother  had  sent 
him  to  church,  and  he  had  returned  late,  he  said :  "  Mother, 
I  have  been  long  absent,  but  I  have  come  back  at  last !  "  And 
Gilbert,  stretching  out  his  arms,  now  cried  the  same  words. 

Out  of  the  well-to-do  and  leisured  class,  the  blade  of  living 
faith  springs  but  sparsely ;  but  in  the  low  and  rugged  plain  of 
labour,  there  the  green  points  show  on  every  side. 

From  the  coalmine  and  the  factory,  from  the  shop-counter 
and  the  clerk's  desk,  from  behind  the  sowing  machine  and  from 
the  plough,  from  the  barracks  and  the  trawler  and  the  iron- 
plated  battleship,  goes  up  the  cry  to-day,  "  Mother,  we  have 
been  long  absent,  but  we  have  come  back  at  last !  " 

The  Societies  which  had  so  great  a  share  in  the  work  of  the 
Revival,  such  as  the  English  Church  Union  and  the  Guild  of 
S.  Alban,  were  founded  by  laymen  and  managed  by  them. 

The  Revival  was  sporadic,  starting  here  and  there,  without 
any  indication  of  concerted  action,  yet  everywhere  animated 
by  the  same  spirit,  and  aiming  in  the  same  direction.  It  was 
like  the  bursting  forth  of  a  thousand  springs  from  every  side, 
but  all  flowing  together  into  one  bed.  The  only  Church  paper, 
and  that  one  of  which  Newman  was  a  founder  and  shareholder, 
was  the  Record,  and  that  became  the  organ  of  the  Low  Church 
party.  The  Guardian  and  the  Church  Times  were  results  of 
the  Revival,  and  not  contributing  causes.  Before  they  appeared, 
Church  Literature  consisted  of  pamphlets  that  circulated  only 
among  the  clergy  and  the  leisured  classes. 

The  breath  of  life  had  passed  over  the  land,  and  the  thrill 
of  a  resurrection  was  felt  everywhere. 

There  is  a  striking  tale  by  Mr.  A.  E.  W.  Mason,  entitled  The 
Broken  Road.  It  tells  how  an  Indian  official  was  set  to  construct 
an  important  highway,  how  he  spent  his  life  upon  it  ;  how,  when 
he  died,  his  nephew  took  up  and  continued  the  task ;  how,  after 
landslides  and  storms  carrying  the  road  away,  hostility  shown 
by  natives,  indifference  displayed  by  Government,  he  fell  a 
victim  to  assassination  ;   how  next  the  son,  as  to  a  solemn 


PROGRESS 


351 


duty,  devoted  himself  to  repair  and  continue  the  road,  ac- 
cording to  the  original  design.  This,  I  take  it,  is  the  story 
of  the  Church,  especially  in  England.  There  have  been  dis- 
astrous cataclysms,  there  has  been  bad  material  used  ;  torrents 
have  swept  over  the  highway,  avalanches  have  buried  the 
track  in  detritus  ;  there  have  been  riots  provoked  by  it,  and 
Government  has  interfered  to  stop  the  work  ;  but  happily  the 
milestones  have  never  been  displaced.  So  soon  as  the  period 
of  devastation  or  of  hindrance  has  been  overpassed,  the  work  of 
restoration  was  begun.  From  the  very  first  start,  men  have 
laboured,  at  one  time  strenuously,  at  another  slackly,  upon 
God's  Royal  Road.  At  the  present  date,  I  am  confident,  from 
the  priest  holding  the  chalice  to  the  crossing-sweeper  with  his 
broom,  there  exists  in  the  hearts  of  thousands  in  every  class, 
and  in  all  parts,  fervent  zeal  to  toil  at  the  Highway  of  the  Lord, 
that  leads  from  the  mountain  in  Galilee,  where  the  Risen  Saviour 
commissioned  His  Apostles,  to  the  hill  of  Zion  and  the  palace 
of  the  Great  King,  paved  and  hedged  in  with  the  Catholic 
Faith,  Apostolic  Order,  and  the  divinely  appointed  Sacraments. 
One  particular  class  of  clerics  may  stand  aside,  shrugging  their 
shoulders,  and  pursing  up  their  lips,  jingling  in  their  pockets 
the  sovereigns  received  from  the  Ecclesiastical  Commissioners. 
Impediments  may  and  will  arise ;  but  the  work  will  go  on.  As 
Sybil  Lindforth  says  in  the  book  from  which  I  take  my  illustra- 
tion :  "  The  Power  of  the  Road  is  beyond  the  Power  of  Govern- 
ments," aye,  and  of  the  whole  world.  Not  among  the  road- 
menders  will  be  found  those  just  alluded  to.  But  lo  !  before 
the  arduous  and  earnest  workers  gleams  a  glorious  Presence, 
leading,  encouraging,  strengthening,  and  promising  achievement. 

Let  us  give  a  hasty  glance  at  the  increase  of  our  Colonial 
and  other  foreign  bishoprics. 

Immediately  on  the  termination  of  the  War  of  Independence, 
the  members  of  the  Church  in  the  United  States  of  America 
realized  that  it  was  a  condition  of  life  or  death  to  the  Church 
to  have  a  bishop  or  bishops  of  their  own.  The  clergy  of  Con- 
necticut elected  Samuel  Seabury,  and  he  sailed  for  England 
in  1783.  Dr.  Moore,  then  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  hesitated 
about  consecrating  him,  and  he  applied  to  the  Scottish  bishops. 
On  November  14,  1781,  he  was  consecrated  Bishop  of  Connec- 
ticut by  three  of  them  in  Aberdeen. 

In  1785  a  convention  of  Church  clergy  and  laymen  met  at 
Philadelphia  and  desired  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  to  con- 


352 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


secrate  for  the  Church  in  the  United  States  two  clergy  whom 
they  sent  over.  This  request  was  complied  with  on  February  4, 
1787,  and  they  were  consecrated  to  the  Sees  of  Pennsylvania 
and  New  York,  by  the  two  Archbishops,  and  the  Bishops  of 
Bath  and  Wells  and  Peterborough.  On  August  12,  1787,  Dr. 
Charles  Inglis  was  consecrated  Bishop  of  Nova  Scotia,  the  first 
English  Colonial  bishop.  In  1793  the  See  of  Quebec  was  founded, 
and  in  1839  that  of  Newfoundland.  In  1814  the  first  English 
bishop  was  sent  to  Calcutta,  and  in  1824  two  bishoprics — those 
of  Jamaica  and  Barbados — were  founded  in  the  West  Indies. 
And  now  in  the  Colonies  and  foreign  parts  we  have  118  bishops, 
the  United  States  has  95. 

At  home  there  were  great  difficulties  encountered  in  the 
forming  of  fresh  dioceses  out  of  those  that  were  old.  The  multi- 
plication of  duties,  along  with  the  rapid  increase  of  the  popula- 
tion, constituted  an  overwhelming  burden  to  the  English  bishops, 
not  felt  when  they  but  little  understood  what  the  work  of  a 
bishop  should  be,  but  realized  more  and  more  as  time  went  on. 
Two  only  had  been  formed  since  the  period  of  the  Reformation, 
and  this  increase  had  been  reduced  by  the  union  of  Gloucester 
and  Bristol.  At  the  time  of  the  passing  of  the  Manchester 
Bishopric  Bill  in  1847,  it  was  proposed  to  found  three  new  sees, 
but  this  had  fallen  through.  The  Cathedral  Commission  in  its 
report  of  1855  had  recommended  the  establishment  of  ten  new 
sees,  but  this  had  been  equally  disregarded.  In  1870,  however, 
Dr.  Christopher  Wordsworth,  Bishop  of  Lincoln,  bethought  him 
of  an  Act  passed  in  the  reign  of  Henry  VIII,  authorizing  the 
appointment  of  suffragan  bishops,  but  the  Act  had  fallen  into 
abeyance.  Proceeding  upon  this,  he  obtained  the  appointment 
of  a  bishop  to  Nottingham,  the  see  being  afterwards  transferred 
to  Southwell.    Suffragans  now  number  thirty-four. 

But  the  appointment  of  suffragan  bishops  did  not  altogether 
meet  the  existing  want,  and  a  special  Act  of  Parliament  was 
passed  to  constitute  S.  Alban's  a  see.  Truro  was  also  founded 
out  of  the  huge  diocese  of  Exeter.  Then  came  Liverpool, 
Newcastle,  Southwell,  and  Wakefield.  There  are  now  thirty- 
seven  dioceses  in  England  and  Wales,  and  more  would  be  created 
but  for  the  obstruction  of  the  Dissenting  and  Orange  members 
of  the  House  of  Commons,  who  oppose  every  attempt  made  to 
improve  the  condition  of  the  Church  and  perfect  her  organization. 

In  1717  Convocation  was  prorogued  by  the  Government  of 
the  day  in  order  to  prevent  its  passing  a  formal  condemnation 


PROGRESS 


353 


of  Hoadly,  Bishop  of  Bangor,  for  heresy  in  his  sermon  On  the 
Kingdom  of  Christ.  The  Lower  House  had  passed  a  declaration 
to  this  effect,  which  was  presented  to  the  Upper  House  on 
May  10,  1 71 7,  whereupon  Convocation  was  summarily  prorogued 
against  its  will  by  the  exercise  of  the  Royal  Supremacy.  For 
all  practical  purposes  it  was  silenced  for  one  hundred  and  thirty- 
five  years.  But  the  prorogation  was  on  all  occasions  the  act 
of  a  subservient  Archbishop  and  Primate,  and,  as  it  appeared 
eventually,  he  had  no  power  to  act  in  this  matter  without  the 
consent  of  his  suffragans. 

After  the  Gorham  Judgment  it  was  felt  by  all  Churchmen 
save  the  Evangelicals  and  Latitudinarians  that  the  Church 
must  be  allowed  to  voice  her  own  opinions.  Several  bishops 
were  opposed  to  its  revival ;  Lord  Shaftesbury,  at  Fishmongers' 
Hall,  used  violent  language  against  it,  protesting  that  it  would  be 
sure  to  encourage  Confession. 

Eminent  lawyers  were  consulted,  and  the  opinion  given 
was  that  Convocation  had  a  right  to  discuss  ecclesiastical 
matters ;  and  it  was  generally  resolved  by  the  clergy  that  the 
next  Convocation,  in  November  1852,  should  act.  The  Times 
and  other  papers  either  denounced  the  assembly  or  sneered  at 
it.  In  the  summer  of  that  year  came  the  election  of  proctors, 
concurrently  with  the  elections  for  the  new  Parliament. 

"  The  Synod  of  the  province  of  Canterbury  met  in  full  force 
at  S.  Paul's  Cathedral  on  the  day  appointed,  November  5,  1852. 
The  cathedral  was  in  a  state  of  the  greatest  confusion,  through 
the  preparations  for  the  Duke  of  Wellington's  funeral,  but  the 
first  glance  at  the  assembled  party,  when  standing  under  the 
dome,  was  enough  to  show  that  Convocation  had  mustered  in 
large  force.  Deans,  archdeacons,  and  proctors  glided  about  full 
of  mutual  recognition  and  inquiries  ;  and  this  whole  group, 
set  off  by  the  picturesque  effect  of  full  canonical  costume, 
presented  a  curious  and  suggestive  scene.  We  saw  a  highly 
educated  and  ecclesiastical- looking  collection  of  men.  They 
looked  like  what  they  were,  and  the  sight  gave  strength  and 
reality  to  our  convictions  that  Convocation  had  met  for  business. 
From  the  dome  a  movement  was  made  towards  the  morning 
chapel  at  the  north-west  comer  of  the  Cathedral.  Here  the 
Bishops  assembled  in  their  red  chimeres,  and  were  shortly  sum- 
moned to  the  west  door  to  receive  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury. 
The  procession  which  forthwith  commenced  towards  the  choir 
of  the  cathedral  was  a  wonderful  phenomenon.  Here  was  the 
23 


354 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Church  of  England  by  representation,  in  its  most  stately  costume. 
There  followed  in  the  rear,  as  the  climax  of  honour,  the  Arch- 
bishop himself,  with  his  long  scarlet  train  borne  by  an  attendant. 
All  marked  to  a  thoughtful  eye  the  ecclesiastical  majesty  of 
Lambeth,  which  enjoys  a  longer  pedigree  and  a  more  uninter- 
rupted history  than  any  temporal  throne  or  dynasty  in  Europe."  1 
After  the  Latin  Service  and  the  election  of  a  prolocutor  by  the 
Lower  House,  the  Convocation  was  prorogued  to  November  12, 
in  the  Jerusalem  Chamber  at  Westminster. 

In  the  northern  province  the  opposition  of  Archbishop  Mus- 
grave  prevented  the  assembly  of  the  Northern  Synod  from  fol- 
lowing the  example  of  that  in  the  south  during  his  life,  but 
obstructives  do  not  live  for  ever,  and  the  Northern  Convocation 
met  under  his  successor  in  1861.  Since  then,  both  Convocations 
have  continued  to  meet,  and  have  done  good  work,  passing 
canons  under  royal  licence  j  and  in  1885  both  Houses  of  Con- 
vocation agreed  to  a  scheme  for  the  constitution  of  a  House  of 
Laymen,  to  be  appointed  by  the  lay  members  of  the  diocesan 
conferences  and  by  the  archbishop,  to  act  as  a  consultative 
adjunct  to  Convocation  on  all  subjects  except  the  definition  and 
interpretation  of  doctrine. 

"  The  revival  of  the  active  life  of  Convocation  is  distinctly 
due  to  Samuel  Wilberforce,  Bishop  of  Oxford.  It  was  extorted 
from  an  unwilling  primate  (Sumner),  an  amiable  prelate  whose 
sympathies  were  not  with  Church  action,  and  who  had  not 
emancipated  himself  from  the  fear  of  the  high  and  low  factions, 
such  as  those  which  squabbled  through  the  reign  of  Queen 
Anne.  His  apprehensions  were  shared  by  many.  Most  of  the 
public  prints  were  divided  in  their  comments  between  expres- 
sions of  the  most  utter  contempt  and  prophecies  of  the  most 
terrible  mischief  from  the  mass  of  contentious  bigots.  These 
prophecies  have  been  utterly  falsified."  2 

The  Church  had  found  her  voice  once  more.  But  Convoca- 
tion is  composed  of  too  many  dignitaries,  and  the  parochial 
clergy  are  not  sufficiently  represented.  Difficulties  have  stood 
in  the  way  of  reform,  and  impatience  has  been  felt  at  the  lack 
of  united  assemblies  in  which  pressing  difficulties  might  be 
considered,  and  men  differing  in  opinion  might  meet  and  ventilate 
their  views.  In  1861  the  Cambridge  Church  Defence  Associa- 
tion invited  about  three  hundred  delegates  from  similar  associa- 

1  Convocation  of  November  1852,  p.  158. 

2  Perry  (G.  G.),  A  History  of  the  English  Church  (1887),  iii.  308. 


PROGRESS 


355 


tions  to  assemble  at  Cambridge  and  take  counsel  together  over 
the  difficulties  of  the  day.  The  Second  Church  Congress  met 
at  Oxford  in  the  ensuing  year,  and  since  then  it  has  become 
an  annual  institution.  Any  member  of  the  Church,  cleric  or 
layman,  may  attend,  and  is  invited  to  speak.  It  passes  no 
resolutions,  but  merely  discusses.  It  has  proved  of  conspicuous 
value  in  removing  asperities,  and  in  getting  men  of  divergent 
views  to  appreciate  the  goodness  there  is  in  those  with  whom 
they  do  not  agree,  and  to  make  allowance  for  them. 

Of  far  greater  importance,  and  a  more  conspicuous  sign  of 
progress,  has  been  the  summoning  of  Pan- Anglican  Conferences. 
In  1865  the  Provincial  Synod  of  Canada  entreated  Archbishop 
Longley  of  Canterbury  to  summon  a  General  Council  of  the 
Anglican  Communion  to  counteract  the  disturbing  cases  of 
Bishop  Colenso  and  the  Essays  arid  Reviews.  The  Convocation 
of  Canterbury  approved  of  the  proposal,  and  Archbishop  Longley, 
after  some  hesitation,  issued  an  invitation  to  all  bishops  of 
the  Anglican  Communion  to  meet  in  1867.  A  large  proportion 
of  the  American  and  Colonial  bishops  were  most  anxious  to 
give  formal  approbation  to  the  excommunication  launched  at 
Bishop  Colenso  by  his  metropolitan,  the  Bishop  of  Cape  Town. 
But  some  English  prelates — notably  Thirlwall  of  S.  David's — 
dreaded  nothing  so  much  as  a  sort  of  synodal  confirmation  of 
the  condemnation.  It  was  purposed  to  meet  for  a  Common 
Communion  at  Westminster  in  the  Abbey,  but  Stanley,  the 
Dean,  had  the  bad  taste — to  use  the  least  offensive  term — to 
refuse  admission  to  them,  and  the  Bishops,  to  the  number  of 
seventy-six,  met  for  intercommunion  at  Lambeth.  The  slight 
put  on  the  American  and  Colonial  bishops  by  Stanley  was 
deeply  resented.  In  December  the  Conference  issued  an  Address 
to  the  Faithf  ul,  characteristically  vague,  but  the  Bishop  of  Cape 
Town  carried  a  resolution  which  was  condemnatory  of  Dr. 
Colenso,  and  declared  the  deposition  right,  by  40  to  3.  The  three 
who  through  thick  and  thin  had  backed  up  Colenso  were  Tait 
of  London,  Thirlwall  of  S.  David's,  and  Sumner  of  Winchester. 

But  the  most  important  result  of  the  Conference  was  that, 
by  uniting  the  bishops  of  the  United  States  of  America,  the 
Colonial  bishops,  and  the  Scotch  as  well,  on  equal  terms  with 
the  English  as  members  of  a  world-wide  Communion,  it  supplied 
a  refutation  of  the  favourite  theory  of  the  Latitudinarians  that 
the  Church  of  England  was  a  State  establishment,  and  nothing 
more. 


356 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


A  second  Conference  was  convened,  much  against  the  liking 
of  Archbishop  Tait,  in  1878,  and  was  attended  by  bishops 
from  all  parts  of  the  world,  to  the  number  of  100.  The  Pan- 
Anglican  Conference  of  1888  saw  145  bishops  gathered  together. 

Another  was  held  in  1897,  which  coincided  with  the  thirteen- 
hundredth  anniversary  of  the  landing  of  S.  Augustine,  and  a 
pilgrimage  was  made  to  the  spot  and  a  commemorative  cross 
was  erected.  To  this  conference  197  bishops  came.  That  of 
1908  was  attended  by  242  bishops,  and  preceded  a  Pan-Anglican 
Congress  attended  by  7,000  clerical  and  lay  delegates  from  all 
countries  under  the  sun. 

There  are  other  indications  of  progress  that  might  be  noted. 
The  first  Sisterhood  was  that  of  Miss  Sellon  at  Plymouth,  in 
1841  ;  then,  in  or  about  1851,  Mrs.  Tennant,  a  widow,  and  a 
Spaniard  by  race,  began  rescue  work  for  fallen  women  at  Clewer. 
At  her  death  a  Sisterhood  was  established  to  carry  on  the  good 
work.  About  1855  the  East  Grinstead  Sisterhood  was  formed 
for  the  nursing  of  sick  people  in  their  homes,  and  the  education 
of  orphan  girls.  Another  Sisterhood  was  that  of  Wantage, 
founded  in  1848;  that  of  S.  Thomas's,  Oxford,  was  started 
a  year  earlier.  They  became  very  numerous,  and  have  their 
branches  all  over  England,  India,  and  the  Colonies.  At  the 
time  of  the  Dissolution  there  were  but  745  Sisters  in  England ; 
at  the  present  date  there  are  over  1,300. 

There  are  now  in  London  alone  nine  Sisterhoods,  and  each 
has  its  branch  establishments.  There  are  also  eighteen  other 
Sisterhoods  in  England  and  Wales.  This  does  not  include  sixty- 
eight  Orphanages  for  girls,  mostly  under  the  care  of  Sisters. 

The  growth  of  Religious  Orders  among  men  has  been  slower. 
One  following  the  Benedictine  rule  was  attempted  by  "  Brother 
Ignatius,"  the  Rev.  J.  Leycester  Lyne,  in  1863 ;  but  he  was 
impulsive,  self-willed,  and  lacking  in  judgment.  I  met  him 
several  times,  and  he  did  not  at  all  attract  me  to  him  and  inspire 
confidence :  with  a  beautiful  face,  with  a  magnificent  voice  and 
flowing  oratory,  he  had  no  gift  as  an  organizer,  and  he  com- 
mitted extraordinary  acts  of  folly.  His  abbey  at  Llanthony 
came  to  naught.  The  most  famous  of  all  Brotherhoods  is  that 
of  the  Cowley  Fathers,  founded  by  the  Rev.  R.  M.  Benson  in 
1865,  which  has  supplied  a  Bishop  to  America.  Beside  the 
mother  house  of  Cowley  it  has  branch  houses  in  London,  at 
Bombay  and  Poona  in 'India,  at  Cape  Town  in  South  Africa,  in 
Kaffraria,  and  at  Boston  in  the  United  States 


PROGRESS 


357 


The  Community  of  the  Resurrection  is  one  of  celibate  clergy 
living  under  a  Rule  with  a  common  purse.  It  originated  in 
1890,  its  mother  house  is  at  Mirfield  in  Yorkshire,  and  it  has 
a  branch  at  Johannesburg.  Its  great  work  is  the  training  of 
candidates  for  Holy  Orders. 

The  Society  of  the  Sacred  Mission  at  Kelham,  Newark-on- 
Trent,  also  trains  for  Holy  Orders  ;  it  has  branches  in  South 
Africa,  Central  Africa,  and  in  Korea. 

I  can  but  briefly  mention  the  Guilds.  The  first  to  be  founded 
was  that  of  S.  Alban  in  185 1.  It  is  an  association  of  laymen 
who  profess  themselves  ready,  by  the  grace  and  under  the 
providence  of  God,  as  loyal  members  of  the  Church  of  England, 
to  do  all  that  they  can  in  answer  to  the  call  of  the  Divine  Master. 
The  objects  are  :  to  assist  in  spreading  a  knowledge  of  the 
Catholic  Faith  and  the  doctrines  of  the  Church,  also  to  support 
the  Church 's  independence  in  spiritual  matters .  Beside  Parochial 
Guilds,  which  are  very  numerous,  there  are  some  twenty-six 
others  whose  headquarters  are  either  in  London  or  in  the  several 
dioceses  in  which  their  work  is  specialized.  "  The  growth  of 
the  Religious  Orders  in  the  English  Church  in  the  period  1845- 
1900  is  almost  without  parallel  in  Christian  history."  1  The 
Bishops,  Archbishops,  and  Convocation  have  all  approved  and 
welcomed  these  institutions. 

Fourteen  years  ago,  in  1898,  was  founded  the  Church  of 
England  Men's  Society  ;  it  consists  of  men  in  every  department 
of  life,  but  mainly  artisans.  In  1908  it  numbered  60,000 
members,  in  1912  it  reached  126,625.  There  are  in  England 
and  Wales  3,730  branches.  It  is  already  a  power,  and  is  destined 
to  become  a  very  much  greater  power. 

What  is  its  work  ?  In  every  direction  it  is  extending,  and  it 
embraces  men  in  earnest  for  God  and  the  Catholic  Church.  The 
two  fundamental  pledges  of  this  Men's  Society  are  prayer  and 
personal  service.  Under  the  first  heading  is  grouped  all  that 
is  intended  to  help  the  spiritual  life  of  the  members,  and  to  bring 
them  in  contact  with  the  Life  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  Many 
of  the  branches  arrange  that  their  members  shall  meet  from 
time  to  time  at  Holy  Communion,  and  especially  in  the  season  of 
Ascensiontide ;  all  over  the  world  branches  of  the  Men's  Society 
are  asked  to  join  in  the  great  Sacrament  of  Loyalty  and  Brother- 
hood, and  to  lay  their  common  petitions  before  Almighty  God, 
for  the  progress  of  the  movement  to  which  they  belong.  On 

1  Dictionary  of  the  English  Church  (1913). 


358 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


the  side  of  personal  service,  new  ways  of  "  doing  something  to 
help  forward  the  work  of  the  Church  "  are  continually  presenting 
themselves.  I  may  instance  two  or  three.  At  Barnstaple  a 
branch  of  the  Men's  Society  is  attached  to  the  principal  parish 
church.  That  church  had  become  dingy  and  dirty.  The 
C.E.M.S.  set  to  work,  erected  scaffolding,  cleaned,  washed, 
scraped,  renovated  the  interior;  and  all  the  work  was  done 
voluntarily,  at  hours  when  the  members  were  off  their  regular 
work.  At  S.  Stephen's,  near  Launceston,  a  parish  club-room 
was  needed.  The  C.E.M.S.  set  to  work  and  built  one.  Except 
for  the  material,  it  cost  not  a  penny.  If  it  be  rumoured  that 
the  Kensit  preachers  are  coming  to  create  a  disturbance,  the 
Men's  Society  members  are  ready  for  them.  They  look  after 
one  another  in  the  Colonies  and  at  home,  and  are  of  vast  service 
to  the  clergy  in  smoothing  difficulties  in  parish  and  mission 
work.  It  has  its  members  in  the  ranks  of  the  Army,  in  the 
Navy,  in  shops,  in  mines,  in  factories,  and  aboard  fishing  smacks, 
abroad  as  well  as  at  home.  There  are  as  many  as  351  branches 
in  Australia,  and  in  New  Zealand  134.  In  the  Army  are  86 
branches,  and  the  Seaman's  Guild  numbers  71  branches.  A 
member  of  the  C.E.M.S.  endeavours  to  be  a  "  handy  man  " 
for  all  sorts  of  Church  work.  I  quote  from  the  Men's  Magazine 
of  October  1912  :  "  Even  summer  reports  show  that  our 
members  are  responding  nobly  to  the  ideal,  and  in  addition  to 
the  various  definitely  religious  work,  such  as  Sunday  school 
teaching  (one  secretary  writes  :  '  All  our  members  are  connected 
with  our  Sunday  school '),  members  are  ready  to  do  anything 
and  everything  that  needs  to  be  done.  One  branch  is  providing 
the  labour  for  building  a  new  mission  hall ;  others  are  beautifying 
and  fencing  off  the  churchyard,  painting  the  railings,  or  assisting 
to  raise  funds  at  bazaars,  either  for  clearing  off  debts  or  extension 
of  work.  One  is  trying  to  get  a  note  of  promise.  Another 
says  :  '  We  had  a  small  stall,  and  realized  nearly  thirty  pounds ; ' 
or  yet  again  :  1  We  find  it  practically  impossible  to  get  a  full 
branch  meeting,  as  the  members,  one  or  other,  are  doing  Church 
work  every  night  in  the  week.'  " 

A  few  words  must  be  said  about  the  English  Church  Union. 
There  had  existed  Unions  of  Churchmen  in  Bristol,  Exeter, 
Chester,  Manchester,  Leeds,  Coventry,  Gloucester,  Norwich, 
Yorkshire,  and  a  South  Church  Union.  These  had  all  done  active 
work  for  the  maintenance  of  the  Faith  and  had  striven  to  press 
on  the  restoration  of  action  to  Convocation.    But  they  had  no 


PROGRESS 


359 


outward  link  binding  them  together,  till  the  outbreak  of  the 
S.  George 's-in-the-East  riots  in  1859,  when  it  was  felt  to  be 
advisable  to  unite  all  these  local  associations  in  one  Union. 
Accordingly  on  February  8,  1859,  a  Conference  of  sixteen  earnest 
Churchmen  met  under  the  chairmanship  of  Sir  Stephen  Glynne, 
and  this  assembled  again  on  May  15  and  founded  the  Church 
of  England  Protection  Society.  All  the  dispersed  Church 
Unions  were  invited  to  join,  and  to  this  all  agreed,  and  in  i860 
the  Society  changed  its  name  to  the  "  English  Church  Union." 
The  objects  it  sets  before  it  are  : 

To  defend  and  maintain  unimpaired  the  doctrine  and  discip- 
line of  the  Church  of  England. 

To  afford  counsel,  protection,  and  assistance  to  all  persons, 
lay  or  clerical,  suffering  under  unjust  aggression  or  hindrance 
in  spiritual  matters. 

In  general,  so  to  promote  the  interests  of  religion  as  to  be,  by 
God's  help,  a  lasting  witness  for  the  advancement  of  the  glory 
and  the  good  of  the  Church. 

Membership  is  strictly  confined  to  communicants  of  the 
English  Church. 

At  present — in  1913 — it  numbers  40,000  laymen,  26  bishops, 
and  4,000  clergy. 

The  number  of  churches  built  or  rebuilt  during  the  first 
seven  years  of  the  nineteenth  century  were  twenty-four.  In 
1875  a  return  was  made  to  Parliament  as  to  the  amount  of 
money  that  had  been  spent  on  church-building  or  church-restora- 
tion, and  it  was  found  that  the  sum  expended  amounted  between 
1840  and  1874  to  £25,548,703.  In  1884  the  amount  spent  in 
one  year  on  the  building  and  restoring  of  churches,  the  building 
of  parsonage-houses,  and  enlargement  of  churchyards,  amounted 
to  £1,455,839,  or,  in  round  numbers,  about  a  million  and  a  half. 
Between  1884  and  1910  it  reached  the  prodigious  sum  of 
£38,219,374.  In  the  year  1910  it  amounted  to  £1,436,776.  In 
1913  in  S.  Paul's  Cathedral  the  jubilee  of  the  Bishop  of 
London's  Fund  for  church-building  in  his  diocese  was  observed 
by  a  solemn  service.  In  the  fifty  years  as  many  as  240 
churches  have  been  built  in  London,  with  districts  appointed  for 
them,  and  endowments  provided.  It  may  well  be  questioned 
whether  in  two  thousand  years  of  Church  history  anything 
quite  so  remarkable  has  taken  place. 

In  Germany,  for  the  building  of  a  church  the  town  finds  the 
money,  or  the  major  part  of  it,  and  in  France  till  of  late  years 


360 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


the  State  contributed  to  the  building  or  restoration.  But  in 
England  the  State  does  not  give  a  penny.  All  the  sums  come 
from  freewill  offerings,  either  made  personally  or  through  one 
of  the  church-building  societies.  This  certainly  does  not  look 
as  though  the  Anglican  Communion  were  in  extremis. 

But  if  there  has  been  progress,  and  unmistakeable  progress, 
there  has  been  a  cooling  down  of  enthusiasm,  and  a  sad  invasion 
of  worldliness  into  the  Church  and  among  the  clergy.  The 
early  Evangelicals  glowed  with  a  holy  and  fervent  zeal  that 
warmed  and  stimulated  such  as  were  brought  into  contact  with 
them.  But  after  a  while  the  heat  passed  away  and  was  suc- 
ceeded by  an  affectation  of  what  had  been  real,  and  became 
formal,  much  as  a  bar  of  iron  dipped  in  vermilion  may  look  like 
one  at  red  heat.  It  was  something  the  same  with  the  Tractarians. 
Those  of  us  who  are  old  can  recall  the  enthusiasm  with  which 
the  first  apostles  of  the  movement  proclaimed  forgotten  truths, 
and  their  sanguine  hopes  of  bringing  the  English  Communion 
back  to  the  glories  of  her  Catholic  past.  They  preached  a  new 
crusade,  like  Peter  the  Hermit  and  S.  Bernard,  and  expected 
that  their  burning  words  would  thrill  all  hearts,  and  that  all 
English  mouths  would  acclaim  "  Dieu  le  volt."  But  they  dis- 
covered that  the  regeneration  of  the  English  Church  was  not 
to  be  effected  suddenly.  The  English  mind  is  slow  to  accept 
new  ideas,  and  slow  to  shake  off  old  prejudices.  In  their  im- 
patience some  threw  up  the  sponge  and  abandoned  the  English 
Communion.  Many  another  plodded  on  through  discourage- 
ment, "  segro  in  corde  senescit,"  saying  with  the  poet : 

Nos  hoc  agimus  tenuique  in  pulvere  sulcos 
Ducimus  et  litus  sterili  versamur  aratro. 

Others,  again,  sank  into  indifference,  and  abandoned  the 
struggle.  Any  white-haired  man  who  knew  the  first  Tractarians 
and  was  carried  forward  by  the  rush  of  their  confidence,  must 
have  noticed  that  at  the  present  day  there  is  little  enthu- 
siasm remaining  among  the  upper  classes.  Fifty  years  ago 
young  men  and  young  women  of  the  gentle  class  caught  the  fire 
and  burned  with  zeal.  I  do  not  see  many  such  now.  In  a 
Russian  church  on  Easter  Eve,  at  the  boom  of  midnight,  the 
new  fire  is  struck,  the  flame  runs  from  candle  to  candle  of  the 
vast  congregation,  till  the  whole  interior  of  the  building  blazes 
with  a  thousand  lights.  The  people  disperse,  some  blow  out 
their  candles,  some  of  the  flames  are  extinguished  by  the  wind 


PROGRESS 


361 


or  falling  snow,  a  few — only  a  few — carry  it  home  to  their 
hearths. 

The  enthusiasm  that  filled  the  first  Tractarians  has  been 
replaced  by  a  less  fiery  spirit.  Immediate  results  are  no  longer 
expected ;  the  successors  of  the  old  Tractarians  are  content  now 
to  endure  discouragement  and  leave  results  in  higher  Hands. 
The  novelty  of  the  movement  brought  with  it  perhaps  extra- 
vagant enthusiasm,  and  some  objectionable  exaggerations 
in  doctrine  and  in  practice.  Sydney  Smith  had  pointed  out  to 
him  one  day  a  man  with  exaggeratedly  wide  trousers  below 
the  knee.  "Is  that  a  sailor?"  he  asked.  "No,  he  is  a 
Highlander,  lately  bare-legged."  "Ah,"  said  the  humorist, 
"  converts  are  always  enthusiasts." 

There  has  been,  to  my  mind,  a  sad  deterioration  in  the 
character  of  the  clergy. 

In  early  days  there  was  a  reaction  against  fox-hunting  and 
amusements  of  that  kind ;  both  the  Evangelicals  and  the 
High  Churchmen  were  opposed  to  the  sinking  of  the  clerical 
character  into  that  of  the  mere  sportsman. 

The  laudatores  temporis  acti  said,  in  defence  of  these  hunting 
and  dancing  parsons,  that  it  brought  the  Church,  innocently 
enough,  into  touch  with  manly  men — the  farmer  and  the  squire 
and  the  yeoman. 

Evangelicals  and  High  Churchmen  set  their  faces  against 
the  clergy  making  themselves  "  cheap  "  in  that  way.  Then 
ensued  a  calm  time,  when  a  good  deal  of  genuine  spiritual  work 
was  done,  and  the  Church  and  the  Power  of  the  Keys  seemed 
upon  the  point  of  prevailing.  But  about  thirty  years  ago  came 
another  reaction.  It  was  supposed  that  the  clergy  were  be- 
coming too  spiritual,  and  were  withdrawing  too  much  into  their 
shells  ;  and  it  was  desirable  that  they  should  get  into  closer 
touch  with  men  and  women,  their  business  and  their  pleasures. 
So  the  long  coats  were  abandoned,  and  short-cut  jackets  adopted. 
Moustaches  were  worn,  mostly  by  the  feeblest  of  curates.  Many 
priests  acted  as  accountants,  impresarios,  sang  comic  songs  on 
a  stage,  became  ardent  tennis-players,  golfers,  hockeyers,  etc., 
always  with  the  same  plea  that  they  were  bringing  the  Church 
into  touch  with  the  people.  It  was  bringing  it  under  their 
feet.  Look  at  the  result !  The  clergy  of  the  Church  of  England, 
take  them  as  a  whole,  are  less  in  touch  with  the  people  than 
was  the  case  fifty  to  eighty  years  ago.  The  laity  laugh  at  the 
idea  that  this  course  brings  the  Church  closer  to  them :  it 


362 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


degrades  the  parson  ;  and  never  were  the  clergy  of  this  type 
looked  on  by  the  well-to-do  with  such  contempt  as  at  the 
present  day. 

Twenty  years  ago  the  clergy  would  not  dance,  nor  go  to 
anything  in  the  shape  of  the  modern  music-hall.  That  is  not 
the  position  now.  They  have  gone  to  the  other  extreme  ;  they 
smoke  with  the  laity,  they  drink  with  them,  and,  for  fear  of 
being  thought  too  starchy,  they  indulge  to  excess  in  athletic 
and  field  sports  and  other  less  innocent  amusement.  It  provokes 
no  little  surprise  (to  use  a  mild  word) ,  on  visiting  the  houses  or 
lodgings  of  the  clergy  who  are  most  anxious  about  getting  into 
touch  with  men  and  boys,  to  see  so  many  "  unexpurgated  " 
editions  on  their  shelves  and  tables,  to  show,  presumably,  how 
very  human  they  are.  What  have  we  to  show  for  this  human- 
izing of  the  priesthood  ?  Empty  churches  and  neglected  Sacra- 
ments. These  men  have  made  themselves  cheap.  "  Ye  are  the 
salt  of  the  earth,"  said  Christ  to  His  apostles,  "  but  if  the  salt 
hath  lost  its  savour,  wherewith  shall  it  be  salted  ?  It  is 
thenceforth  good  for  nothing,  but  to  be  cast  out  and  to  be 
trodden  under  the  foot  of  men" — and  trodden  under  the  foot 
of  men  these  moust ached,  bridge-playing,  comic-song-singing, 
capering  parsons  are.  Was  there  ever  any  saltness  in  them  ? 
Never  any  saline  particle  in  these  curtailed  clerics,  and  they 
have  borne  a  false  label — Salt — whereas  they  were  only  washing 
soda. 

Thank  God  there  are  still  devoted  and  earnest  men  in  the 
ministry  of  the  Church,  and  these  will  save  her.  And  among 
the  laity  of  the  middle  and  lower  classes  there  is  growing  an 
eager  devotion  to  the  Church,  wherever  the  clergy  are  doing 
their  duty. 

It  is  where  there  are  men  living  and  expending  themselves 
for  God  and  human  souls  that  the  Church  makes  way — and 
that  marvellously.  The  other  day  I  was  in  a  large  church  in 
the  extreme  east  of  London.  It  was  crowded  on  Sunday,  both 
morning  and  evening.  And — as  the  Vicar  said  to  me — there 
was  not  a  rich  family  in  the  place,  not  a  housewife  who  did  not 
scrub  her  doorstep  every  morning. 

That  there  is  a  steady  influx  of  Dissenters  into  the  Church, 
and  that  such  is  growing  in  volume,  is  a  fact  that  can  hardly  be 
doubted.  It  is  this,  in  Wales,  that  has  roused  such  political 
animosity.  But  it  is  the  same  also  in  the  United  States  of 
America,  where  the  Church  started  under  manifold  disadvan- 


PROGRESS 


363 


tages.  Far  surpassed  in  numbers  and  wealth  by  various  sects 
which  occupied  the  ground  before  the  Church  received  any 
bishops,  it  has  steadily  gained  in  the  respect  of  the  people,  and 
in  the  number  of  its  adherents.  It  does  more :  it  attracts  to  its 
ministry,  year  by  year,  the  very  flower  of  the  sectarian  pastorate. 
As  far  back  as  1883  this  was  noticed,  and  Professor  Hopkins, 
of  the  Presbyterian  Seminary  at  Auburn  (N.Y.),  wrote:  "A 
very  large  number  of  the  children  of  Presbyterian  families, 
and  many  of  the  cultivated  and  tasteful  of  our  number,  have 
sought  a  more  cheerful,  more  varied,  more  sympathetic  service 
in  another  Communion.  There  is  not  a  Presbyterian  pastor  in 
the  land  but  can  testify  to  such  losses.  The  Anglican  Church 
has  been  largely  recruited  from  our  ranks.  There  are  many 
thousands  in  that  Church  at  present  who  have  been  drawn  away 
merely  by  the  superior  attractions  of  its  cultus.  Certainly  they 
have  not  been  enticed  by  the  greater  impressiveness  or  elo- 
quence of  the  pulpit.  .  .  .  The  tracks  are  all  one  way.  Look 
through  any  circle  of  your  acquaintanceship  and  count  up  the 
Presbyterian  families  in  which  one,  two,  or  more  lambs  have 
strayed  into  the  Bishop's  fold  ...  It  is  very  largely  due  to 
this  fact,  that,  of  all  sects  in  the  United  States,  the  Anglican  is 
growing  the  most  rapidly  at  the  present  time.  It  is  forming  new 
congregations  and  organizing  new  dioceses  with  extraordinary 
rapidity.  On  the  other  hand,  the  Presbyterian  Church  is  almost 
stationary.  It  requires  a  close  calculation  to  show  that  she  is 
even  holding  her  own."  1  This  was  written  in  1883 — and  now, 
in  1913,  it  is  truer  still.  The  Church,  like  a  rolling  snowball, 
gathers  substance  and  size  with  each  succeeding  year. 

It  was  wont  to  be  said  that  well-to-do  Dissenters'  children 
joined  the  Church  for  social  reasons.  This  hardly  is  the  case 
now,  when  knighthoods,  baronetcies,  and  coronets  have  been 
showered  on  Nonconformists  by  the  Radical  Government.  As  far 
as  my  experience  goes,  and  with  mine  coincides  that  of  most 
clergy  with  whom  I  have  spoken  on  the  subject,  it  is  the  earnest 
and  devout  among  the  sectarians  who  come  over  to  the  Church : 
their  souls  crave  for  worship,  and  they  get  only  preaching  in 
their  chapels  ;  they  desire  building  up  in  the  Faith,  and  they 
get  only  noisy  sensationalism  in  the  meeting-house,  or  venomous 
political  diatribes.  That  such  a  phenomenon  should  manifest 
itself  equally  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic,  under  very  different 
conditions,  and  in  both  be  due  to  the  rise  of  High  Churchman- 
1  Quoted  in  Church  Quarterly  Review,  No.  32,  1883. 


364 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


ship,  a  lifting  of  the  dignity  of  worship  and  a  strengthening  of 
dogmatic  teaching,  is  significant. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  disestablished  Church  of  Ireland  has 
consistently  upheld  the  Protestant,  as  opposed  to  the  Catholic 
interpretation  of  the  formularies,  and  has  toned  down  its  wor- 
ship to  the  lowest  note  of  its  diapason.  Consequently,  every 
cleric  who  has  any  Church  instincts  flees  from  Ireland,  and  comes 
to  England  to  take  a  curacy  and  obtain  a  living  where  are  to  be 
found  those  things  which  the  Irish  Church  has  repudiated. 
There  was,  and  exists  still,  an  exodus  of  the  ultra-Evangelical 
clergy  to  England  for  the  livings  to  be  had  from  the  Protestant 
Societies,  but  there  is  also  this  other  migration  for  conscience' 
sake,  because  the  Catholic-minded  man  cannot  get  that  in  the 
Irish  disestablished  Church  which  he  needs,  where  the  worship 
is  rendered  in  so  bald  a  fashion  as  to  be  repugnant  to  the  feel- 
ings ;  why,  the  very  internal  appearance  of  one  of  the  churches 
strikes  a  chill  to  the  heart,  where  the  cross  of  Christ  has  actually 
been  ejected  from  them,  and  only  tolerated  outside  on  the 
apex  of  a  gable.  Consequently  the  Irish  Church  is  suffering  like 
a  man  bled  in  both  arms. 

The  teaching  of  experience  is  that  a  body  such  as  is  the 
Anglican  Church  lives  and  flourishes  by  virtue  of  her  Catholicity, 
by  absorbing  what  agrees  with  her  constitution,  by  rejecting 
all  that  is  strange  and  new-fangled  in  doctrine.  When  she 
pursues  her  course  along  the  road  traced  out  for  her  by  Christ, 
His  Apostles,  and  the  Ancient  Fathers,  then  she  advances  from 
strength  to  strength ;  but  should  she  lend  an  ear  to  strange 
counsellors,  she  loses  ground.  When  a  man  is  half-drowned, 
and  his  lungs  are  full  of  water,  he  is  flung  across  a  barrel,  and 
the  liquid  allowed  to  drain  out  of  him,  and  then  he  is  pommelled 
in  the  chest  to  expel  the  last  drop,  and  to  restore  the  play  of  the 
lungs  to  respire  again  the  pure  air  of  heaven.  It  has  been 
something  like  this  with  the  English  Church.  She  had  inhaled 
deleterious  matter  instead  of  the  breath  of  God,  and  she  has 
had  to  get  rid  of  this  in  order  to  recover  life.  The  process  has 
been  painful.  It  cannot  be  asserted  that  she  is  already  wholly 
free,  and  till  she  is,  she  must  lie  across  the  cask  and  submit 
to  pommelling. 

Something  should  be  said  about  our  Church  music — and 
here,  to  a  large  extent,  there  is  progress  only  into  confusion. 

In  the  Early  Victorian  days  there  could  be  no  real  congrega- 
tional music  in  village  churches,  because  the  bulk  of  the  con- 


PROGRESS 


365 


gregation  could  not  read.  The  old  orchestra  was  bad,  the  in- 
struments were  often  out  of  tune,  and  the  performers  delighted  in 
playing  music  beyond  their  capacity  of  rendering  respectably. 

In  1 841,  at  the  consecration  of  Leeds  Parish  Church,  came 
the  first  application  of  the  cathedral  service.  Thence  it  spread 
even  to  small  country  parishes,  and  it  was  held  as  an  axiom 
that  the  "  cathedral  should  be  the  model  for  the  diocese."  Then 
in  came  surpliced  choirs  located  in  the  chancel,  cut  off  from 
the  congregation — supposed  to  lead  it,  but  actually  silencing  it. 

I  fear  that  we  are  perpetuating  an  evil  by  our  choral  festivals. 
The  choirs  of  a  rural  deanery  are  given  intricate  and  totally  un- 
congregational  music  to  practise,  and  then  are  gathered  together 
at  the  cathedral  or  in  some  great  parish  church  to  show  forth 
their  skill.  A  bad  type  of  Church  music  is  fostered  thereby, 
and  a  bad  lesson  taught — that  the  choir,  composed  of  men,  boys, 
and  girls,  is  to  sing  to  the  congregation,  instead  of  being,  as  they 
should  be,  helps  to  the  congregation. 

It  was  considered  the  correct  thing  to  have  a  surpliced  choir, 
and  this  even  in  small  country  parishes.  The  result  has  been 
deplorable.  Bad  as  was  the  choir  perched  on  high  in  a  west 
gallery,  worse  by  far  is  the  choir  in  the  chancel,  and  the  organ 
moved  into  an  eastern  side-aisle.  The  organ  and  choir  are 
needed  to  back  up  the  congregation.  The  best  place  for  the 
organ  is  at  the  west  end,  and  for  the  choir  the  seats  behind 
the  congregation,  though  not  in  a  gallery.  Moreover,  unhappily, 
but  very  naturally,  choir  and  organist  desire  to  show  themselves 
off  and  perform  musical  gymnastics.  They  desire  to  sing 
florid  cathedral  music  and  intricate  anthems  and  "  services," 
all  utterly  and  unredeemedly  uncongregational.  As  Bishop 
Gore  said  in  his  primary  charge  at  Worcester  in  1904  :  "  In 
most  parish  churches  we  have  fallen,  I  know  not  how,  under 
the  despotism  of  choirs."  The  people  come  together  to  worship 
God,  not  to  listen  to  elaborate  music  in  which  they  cannot  join. 
Let  the  richest  music  be  given  in  our  cathedrals,  but  in  our 
parish  churches  let  the  service  be  entirely  congregational. 

In  1844,  in  Margaret  Street  Chapel,  now  replaced  by  the  stately 
church  of  All  Saints',  the  old  Plain  Chant  was  revived,  after  a 
century  of  disuse.  The  Anglican  Chant  grew  out  of  it,  and 
finally  superseded  the  Faux  Bourdon,  which  consists  in  the  Plain 
Song  being  in  the  tenor,  with  the  treble  and  alto  superposed. 
No  one  who  has  heard  the  Faux  Bourdon  in  a  French  church 
can  fail  to  admit  how  splendid  is  the  effect,  when  the  first  and 


366 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


third  verses,  and  so  on,  of  the  Magnificat  or  Psalms,  are  sung 
to  the  tone,  and  the  alternate  verses  in  this  rich  harmony. 

The  Anglican  Chant  did  not  invade  our  cathedrals  till  1730 
or  1740,  displacing  the  beautiful  music  of  the  Catholic  Church. 
Some  of  the  old  Anglicans  are  actually  Faux  Bourdons,  but  the 
tone  is  no  longer  sung  alternately  with  the  chant,  and  loses  its 
effect.  Moreover,  by  barring  the  music,  the  rhythmic  character 
of  the  words  of  the  psalm  has  been  lost.  Our  Church  music  is  now 
in  a  condition  of  anarchy,  and  what  is  needed  is  to  standardize 
it  on  an  old  English  basis.  Till  this  is  done,  the  course  of  our 
progress  will  not  be  complete.  The  subject  is  so  vital  that  I 
shall  recur  to  it  in  another  chapter. 

Take  the  matter  of  hymnals.  In  early  days  a  prejudice 
existed  among  High  Churchmen  against  their  use.  Even  the 
late  Canon  Woodard,  the  founder  of  so  many  Church  schools, 
was  reluctantly  brought  to  consent  to  the  introduction  of  a 
hymn-book.  He  could  not  see  what  need  there  was  to  go  beyond 
Tait  and  Brady.  The  Evangelicals  introduced  these  hymnals, 
usually  of  a  washy,  mawkish  sentimentality  in  some  hymns, 
and  grouped  under  fanciful  headings,  not  in  the  order  of  the 
Church's  seasons.  Now  Hymns  Ancient  and  Modern  includes  the 
best  of  the  Evangelical  hymns,  and  they  are  very  good ;  it  is 
also  of  a  definite  Church  tone,  and  is  found  everywhere.  It  was 
launched  in  1861,  and  by  the  end  of  1912  over  sixty  million 
copies  had  been  sold. 

I  have  left  to  the  last  one  of  the  most  important  and  far- 
reaching  tokens  of  progress.  On  September  15,  1896,  Leo  XIII 
issued  an  unqualified  condemnation  of  Anglican  Orders,  and, 
with  singular  indiscretion,  gave  as  his  reasons  defect  of  form,  in 
that  there  was  no  delivery  to  the  priest  of  the  instruments, 
and  deficiency  of  intention  in  the  consecration  of  bishops.  The 
English  Archbishops  thereupon  issued  a  formal  and  authorita- 
tive reply  and  declaration  as  to  the  status  of  the  Anglican 
Church.  It  was  a  pronouncement  ex  cathedra,  not  only  of  the 
Archbishops,  but  of  the  whole  Anglican  episcopate. 

The  Responsio  Archiepiscoparum  Anglice  began  with  a  few 
words  of  introduction.  It  addressed  the  Pope  of  Rome  as 
"  our  venerable  brother,"  and  treated  him  as  equally  with  them- 
selves amenable  to  the  Universal  Episcopate  of  the  Catholic 
Church,  East  and  West.  They  were  able  to  show  that  the 
porrectio  instrumentorum  did  not  exist  in  the  ancient  Roman 
Pontifical ;  they  indicated  the  uncertainties  both  of  practice 


PROGRESS 


367 


and  of  formularies :  "  From  these  documents  so  obviously 
discordant  and  indefinite,  no  one,  however  wise,  could  extract 
with  certainty  what  was  considered  essential  and  necessary  to 
Holy  Orders  by  the  Roman  Pontiffs."  As  to  intent,  the  Arch- 
bishops pointed  out  that  what  the  Church  says  is  the  index  of 
her  mind,  and  they  demanded  that  the  English  Ordinal  should 
be  judged  by  the  facts  of  history  and  by  the  requirements  of 
Scripture.  They  showed  that,  on  the  points  of  priesthood  and 
Sacrifice,  it  comes  up  to  the  standard  of  the  Western  Ordinals. 
They  went  out  of  their  way  to  state  specifically  the  Anglican 
doctrine  with  regard  to  the  Eucharistic  Sacrifice,  and  they 
concluded  with  the  words,  "  The  Sacrifice  of  the  Eternal  Priest 
and  the  Sacrifice  of  the  Church  ...  in  some  ways  certainly  are 
one." 

The  whole  document  was  bold  and  Catholic,  resting  on  all 
that  was  Scriptural,  Primitive,  and  Apostolic,  and  may  safely 
be  said  to  have  established  the  Anglican  position  on  an  impreg- 
nable basis. 

A  German  writer  describes  the  Bay  of  Naples  after  the  abating 
of  the  sirocco  or  tramontana.  He  says  that  for  a  mile  out 
the  water  of  the  gulf  is  charged  with  dirty  paper,  rotten  oranges, 
broken  corks,  scraps  of  torn  nets.  For  some  time  this  filthy 
wash  remains,  but  gradually  sinks  or  disappears  till  again  the 
glad  waters  are  limpid  and  blue.  This  is  what  has  taken  place, 
and  is  still  taking  place,  in  the  Anglican  Church.  She  has 
harboured,  and  been  sullied  with,  a  thousand  abuses  ;  there  has 
been  non-residence,  pluralism,  neglect  of  duty  to  the  people  and 
of  observance  of  duty  to  God  ;  there  have  been  indifference, 
disbelief,  tampering  with  Dissent,  with  negations,  with  false 
doctrine.  Efforts  were  made,  determined  efforts,  to  keep  the 
refuse  together,  and  prevent  the  waters  from  purifying  them- 
selves ;  but  in  vain.  All  the  alien  stuff  thrown  into  the  Church 
must  gravitate  to  the  bottom.  It  has  rottenness  in  itself.  It 
is  not  and  never  was  a  part  of  the  Church — an  organic  portion : 
it  was  an  importation.  God  never  designed  the  Church  to  be 
a  religious  cesspool. 


CHAPTER  XVI 


THE  BROAD  CHURCH 


HERE  is  a  passage  in  Mr.  H.  G.  Wells's  story  Mar- 
riage in  which  is  described  the  condition  of  modern 
thought  with  regard  to  Christianity. 


"  The  invisible  selves  of  men  were  never  so  jumbled, 
so  crowded  and  complicated  and  stirred  about  as  they  are  at  the 
present  time.  Once,  I  am  told,  they  had  a  sort  of  order,  were 
sphered  in  religious  beliefs,  crystal-clear,  were  arranged  in  a 
cosmogony  that  fitted  them  as  hand  fits  glove,  were  separated 
by  definite  standards  of  right  and  wrong,  which  presented  life 
as  planned  in  all  the  essential  aspects  from  the  cradle  to  the 
grave.  Things  are  so  no  longer.  That  sphere  is  broken  for 
most  of  us,  even  if  it  is  tied  about  and  mended  again  ;  it  is  burst 
like  a  seed-case  ;  things  have  fallen  out  and  things  have  fallen 
in."  This  is  absolutely  true  of  members  of  the  well-to-do  and 
more  or  less  cultured  classes.  It  is  true  of  old,  middle-aged, 
and  young,  of  women  and  men.  There  is  no  hostility  enter- 
tained towards  Christianity,  only  indifference.  A  vague  belief 
in  God  exists,  but  is  inert,  and  there  is  respect  for  Christ  as  one 
higher  in  quality  than  Buddha  and  Mahomet,  but  belonging 
to  the  same  category.  There  is  Christian  morality,  honour, 
truth,  charity,  and  chastity,  very  generally  hanging  on  after 
that  which  produced  these  flowers  has  decayed.  Phaedrus  tells 
of  the  old  woman  who  found  an  empty  wine-cask.  Applying 
her  nose  to  the  bung-hole,  "  Ah !  "  said  she,  "  how  good  you 
must  have  been  when  full."  And  what  remains  of  virtue  in 
sceptical  social  and  private  life  is  the  aroma  of  lost  Christianity. 

That  a  certain  number  of  the  clergy  should  have  been  infected 
with  this  unrest  as  to  the  basis  of  the  Faith  is  not  to  be  wondered 
at.  "  It  is  very  plain,"  they  say,  "  that  Christianity  can  only 
influence  the  age  if  it  looks  that  age  full  in  the  face,  and  accom- 
modates itself  to  the  prevalent  ideas  and  modes  of  thought 

368 


THE  BROAD  CHURCH 


369 


of  those  with  whom  it  has  to  deal.  If  the  age  were  perfectly 
stationary,  then  there  would  be  no  need  for  adaptation.  The 
exposition  and  defence  of  Christianity  that  served  in  the  days 
of  Paley  and  Berkeley  would  serve  to-day.  But  such  is  not 
the  case.  So  far  from  remaining  stationary,  the  world  is  ever 
on  the  change,  and  in  such  an  age  as  this  the  changes  are  momen- 
tous." This  is  what  the  Broad  Churchmen  recognize,  and  they 
endeavour  to  adapt  the  doctrines  of  Christianity  to  the  notions 
of  the  day ;  but  this  they  can  only  effect  by  treating  them  as 
boys  do  eggs,  blowing  out  their  contents,  but  preserving  the  shells 
as  curiosities  for  the  colour  and  mottling.  The  great  doctrines 
of  Christianity — the  Incarnation,  the  Resurrection,  and  the 
Ascension — cannot  be  so  treated.  It  is  an  effort  to  put  the 
new  wine  into  old  bottles,  to  patch  the  old  garment  with  new 
cloth.  I  quite  allow  that  what  the  Broad  Churchmen  aim  at  is 
to  reconcile  the  intellect  of  the  present  day,  which  is  divorced 
from  Revealed  Religion.  But  can  they  effect  it  ?  Certainly 
not  by  eviscerating  every  Christian  doctrine  of  its  life  and  power. 
Of  what  good  are  these  doctrines  when  robbed  of  their  power  ? 
As  little  as  exploded  cartridges  we  come  upon  in  the  grass  and 
kick  aside. 

One  may  be  in  possession  of  a  beautiful  old  house,  rich  in 
carved  oak,  tapestries,  and  plaster  ceilings,  but  defective  in 
sanitary  arrangements,  cold  and  damp,  and  difficult  to  light 
satisfactorily.  The  owner  naturally  and  reasonably  desires 
to  adapt  it  to  the  requirements  of  modern  life.  But  for  this 
purpose  he  would  not  rip  up  the  foundations.  Even  if  there 
were  cracks  in  the  walls  he  would  do  no  more  than  consolidate 
them.  And  so  with  regard  to  the  Church  ;  we  are  bound  to 
endeavour  to  accommodate  it  to  the  mentality  of  the  present 
day,  but  not  to  touch  the  foundations  ;  or,  if  we  touch  them,  it 
must  be  only  to  run  cement  about  them. 

As  Mephistopheles,  "  the  Spirit  I  that  evermore  denies," 
says  to  Faust,  so  might  the  Spirit  of  Negation  address  one  of 
the  clerical  Broad  Churchmen:  "Why  dost  thou  seek  our 
fellowship,  if  thou  canst  not  go  through  with  it  ?  " 

We  must,  however,  distinguish  between  two  classes  of  Broad 
Churchism.  A  very  large  number  of  men  in  the  Church,  in 
the  Kirk,  and  in  the  Chapel,  have  been  influenced  by  the  Higher 
Criticism  ;  and  they  see  clearly  that  the  old  doctrine  of  verbal 
inspiration  of  the  Scriptures  is  no  more  tenable.  That  is  one 
thing,  but  the  rejection  of  the  truths  enunciated  in  the  Creed 
24 


370 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


is  quite  another.  There  is  a  legitimate  place  for  the  former 
in  the  ministry  of  the  Church,  but  not  for  the  latter. 

We  should  remember  the  words  of  S.  Jerome  relative  to  the 
interpretation  of  Scripture  :  "  It  is  customary  in  Scripture  for 
the  historian  to  give  the  common  opinion  as  generally  received 
in  his  own  day  ;  "  and  again,  "  Many  things  are  related  in  the 
Scriptures  according  to  the  opinion  of  the  day  in  which  the 
facts  occurred,  and  not  according  to  what  in  reality  took  place 
(et  non  juxta  quod  rei  Veritas  continebat)."  According  to  his 
canon  the  account  of  the  miracle  of  Bethoron,  as  usually  under- 
stood, would  represent  the  general  impression  left  on  the  minds 
of  the  combatants  by  a  long-protracted  day  of  battle,  and  not 
be  a  statement  of  what  literally  occurred.1  What  perplexities 
of  mind,  what  doubts  and  distresses  would  have  been  avoided, 
had  the  canon  of  S.  Jerome  been  held  to  be  at  least  permissible  I 

The  Church  has  never  defined  how  far  inspiration  goes  in 
Scripture  ;  but  what  she  has  done  is  to  lay  hold  of  certain 
historic  facts  relative  to  Our  Lord,  and  dogmas  as  to  the  Godhead, 
and  to  insist  on  the  acceptance  of  these  by  such  as  pertain  to 
her  Communion,  above  all  by  such  as  minister  at  her  altars 
and  preach  in  her  pulpits. 

And  it  is  with  reference  to  those  who  more  or  less  openly 
disbelieve  in  these  tenets,  that  what  I  have  to  say  applies. 

I  venture  to  quote  from  an  article  on  "  The  Sterile  Party  " 
from  the  Church  Times  of  February  7,  1913 :  "  Latitudinarians 
of  the  newer  sort  sit  to-day  in  the  high,  or  at  least  the  profitable 
places  of  the  Church.  Not  to  mention  the  five  or  six  bishoprics 
in  the  two  Provinces  which  may  be  regarded  as  Latitudinarian 
preserves,  we  notice  that  the  deaneries  especially  seem  to  be 
regarded  as  their  due.  A  glance  down  the  list  of  deans  reveals 
the  fact  that  no  fewer  than  sixteen  are  members  of  the  party. 
Canonries  also  without  number  fall  to  them.  It  can  hardly 
be  contended  that  all  these  dignitaries  are  distinguished  persons  j 
of  some,  indeed,  no  one  had  ever  heard,  until  their  merit  was 

1  The  difficulty  about  sun  and  moon  standing  still  is  due  to  mistrans- 
lation. The  true  rendering  of  the  Hebrew,  as  has  been  pointed  out  by 
Keil  and  Delitzsch,  is  "The  sun  and  moon  became  silent,  or  entered  into 
their  habitation,"  i.e.  became  obscured.  There  had  been  a  hailstorm, 
and  the  dense  vapours  obscured  the  heavenly  bodies  ;  and  as  the  Amorites 
were  sun  and  moon  worshippers,  this  would  increase  their  panic.  The 
address  of  Joshua  and  the  answer  should  run  :  "Be  silent  (darkened), 
O  sun,  upon  Gibeon,  and  thou,  moon,  in  the  valley  of  Ajalon  !  And 
silent  (darkened)  was  the  sun  and  silent  (invisible)  was  the  moon,  till  the 
people  avenged  them  on  their  enemies." 


THE  BROAD  CHURCH 


371 


discovered  by  acute  politicians  and  they  were  set  in  their  stalls. 
Nor  will  it  be  maintained  that  they  are  the  men  who  make  the 
best  use  of  the  cathedral  churches.' ' 

Long  ago  Goethe  had  said  (Israel  in  der  Wuste) :  "  All  those 
epochs  in  which  belief  is  supreme,  under  whatsoever  form  it 
may  be,  are  brilliant,  elevating,  and  fruitful  for  contemporaneous 
times  and  for  posterity.  All  those,  on  the  contrary,  in  which 
unbelief,  be  it  under  whatsoever  form  it  will,  maintains  a  direful 
supremacy — even  if  it  should  shine  for  a  moment  with  a  tinsel 
brilliancy — vanish  before  posterity,  because  no  one  willingly 
torments  himself  with  a  knowledge  of  the  unfruitful." 

At  the  Reformation  a  basis  was  sought  whence  to  fight  the 
doctrine  of  the  Infallibility  of  the  Church.  Faith  in  that  infalli- 
bility had  broken  down.  The  Church,  under  the  domination  of 
the  Papacy,  had  harboured  the  grossest  abuses,  thrown  her  mantle 
over  the  most  preposterous  superstitions.  The  Reformers 
required  another  infallibility  to  pit  against  that  claimed  by 
the  See  of  Rome,  and  they  found  what  they  wanted  in  the 
Bible.  It  was  to  them  the  Word  of  God,  not  to  be  disputed, 
doubted,  or  disobeyed.  It  did  not  occur  to  them  that  Scrip- 
ture stood  on  precisely  the  same  footing  as  the  Church.  In 
both  there  is  the  human  and  fallible  element  united  with  the 
divine  and  infallible.  What  they  wanted  was  a  weapon  with 
which  they  might  smite  their  foes  hip  and  thigh,  and  they  used 
it  with  vigour  and  success.  But  there  was  gross  exaggeration, 
and  every  exaggeration  produces  a  revulsion. 

When  those  who  had  been  taught  that  every  word  of  the 
Bible  was  inspired  came  to  find,  as  they  thought,  that  the  ac- 
counts of  the  Creation,  the  Flood,  and  the  Tower  of  Babel  were 
legends  containing  an  element  of  truth,  but  were  also  stricken 
with  the  infirmity  that  touches  all  legendary  matter,  their  faith 
dissolved  like  snow  in  summer,  and  in  its  dissolution  swept 
away  with  it  all  their  Christianity. 

J.  Anthony  Froude's  Nemesis  of  Faith,  published  in  1849, 
illustrates  this  theme.  There  is  in  the  book  a  beautiful  and 
pathetic  passage  that  I  must  quote,  because  it  expresses  exactly 
the  aspect  of  disbelief  of  the  present  age.  He  is  representing 
an  ancient  ruin  as  speaking :  "  Look  at  me.  Centuries  have 
rolled  away  ;  the  young  conqueror  (Christianity)  is  decrepit 
now,  dying  as  the  old  (Pagan)  faith  died,  and  lingering  where 
it  lingered.  The  same  sad  sweet  scene  is  acting  over  once  again. 
I  was  the  college  of  the  priests,  and  they  are  gone,  and  I  am 


372 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


but  a  dead  ruin  where  the  dead  bury  their  dead.  The  village 
church  is  outliving  me  for  a  few  generations;  there  still  ring, 
Sunday  after  Sunday,  its  old  reverent  bells,  and  there  come  still 
the  simple  peasants  in  their  simple  dresses — pastor  and  flock 
still  in  their  own  beliefs,  there  beneath  the  walls  and  ruins  they 
still  gather  down  into  the  dust ;  fathers  and  children  sleeping 
there  together,  waiting  for  immortality ;  wives  and  husbands 
resting  side  by  side  in  the  fond  hope  that  they  shall  wake  and 
link  again  the  love-chain  which  death  has  broken,  so  simple, 
so  reverend,  so  beautiful.  Yet  is  not  that,  too,  all  passing  away, 
away  beyond  recall  ?  The  fairies  dance  no  more  around  the 
charmed  forest  ring.  They  are  gone.  The  creed  still  seems 
to  stand,  but  the  creed  is  dead  in  the  thoughts  of  mankind. 
Its  roots  are  cut  away,  down  where  alone  it  can  gather  strength 
for  life,  and  other  forms  are  rising  there  ;  and  once  again,  and 
more  and  more,  as  day  passes  after  day,  the  aged  faith  of  aged 
centuries  will  be  exiled  as  the  old  was,  to  the  simple  inhabitants 
of  these  simple  places.  Once,  once  for  all,  if  you  would  save  your 
heart  from  breaking,  learn  this  lesson — once  for  all  you  must 
cease,  in  this  world,  to  believe  in  the  eternity  of  any  creed  and 
form  at  all.  Whatever  grows  in  time  is  a  child  of  time,  and  is 
born  and  lives,  and  dies  at  the  appointed  day  like  ourselves. 
To  be  born  in  pain,  and  nursed  in  hardship,  a  bounding  imagina- 
tive youth,  a  strong  vigorous  manhood,  a  decline  which  refuses 
to  believe  it  is  a  decline  and  still  asserts  its  strength  to  be  what 
it  was,  a  decrepit  old  age,  a  hasty  impatient  heir,  and  a  death- 
bed made  beautiful  by  the  abiding  love  of  some  few  true- 
hearted  friends  ;  such  is  the  round  of  fate  through  nature,  through 
the  seasons,  through  the  life  of  each  of  us,  through  the  life  of 
families,  of  States,  of  forms  of  government,  of  creeds.  It  was 
so,  it  is  so,  it  ever  will  be  so.  Life  is  change ;  to  cease  to  change 
is  to  cease  to  live  :  yet  if  you  may  shed  a  tear  beside  the  death- 
bed of  an  old  friend,  let  not  your  heart  be  silent  on  the  dissolving 
of  a  faith." 

This  is  beautiful  writing.  I  know  few  passages  more  beauti- 
ful. Yet  I  disbelieve  entirely  in  what  it  insists  upon.  I  do 
not  for  one  moment  hold  that  Christianity  is  foredoomed  to 
perish,  because  those  well-off  in  the  world's  goods,  the  readers 
of  novels  and  magazines,  and  persistent  golf-players,  Tango- 
dancers,  scholars,  students  also,  have  lost  their  faith.  What 
Froude  and  the  Latitudinarians  fail  to  understand  is  that  the 
power  of  Christianity  does  not  reside  in  a  form  of  religion,  but 


THE  BROAD  CHURCH 


373 


in  the  person  of  Christ,  Who  manifests  Himself  and  ever  will 
manifest  Himself  in  the  human  soul  as  a  Master.  What  He 
said  to  Simon  Peter  is  still  true,  and  men  know  that  it  is  true. 
"  Flesh  and  blood  hath  not  revealed  it  unto  thee,  but  My  Father, 
which  is  in  heaven." 

"  You  make  a  mistake,"  said  Caleb  Bateson ;  "  you  go  con- 
founding principles  with  persons.  It  isn't  my  love  for  my  wife 
that  lights  the  fire  and  cooks  the  dinner,  and  makes  my  little 
home  like  heaven  to  me — it's  my  wife  herself.  It  isn't  my 
children's  faith  in  their  daddy  that  fed  'em  and  clothed  'em 
when  they  were  too  little  to  work  for  themselves — it  was  me 
myself.  And  it  isn't  the  religion  of  Christ  that  keeps  us  straight 
in  this  world  and  makes  us  ready  for  the  next — it  is  Christ 
Himself."  1  That  is  just  the  verity  hidden  from  the  wise  and 
prudent  Broad  Churchman,  which  is  revealed  to  babes,  even  in 
the  lowest  tabernacles  of  the  rudest  Dissent. 

I  venture  to  quote  from  a  recent  sermon  by  the  Bishop  of 
London  at  the  close  of  a  mission  :  "  I  do  not  think  I  have  ever 
had  in  my  life  such  a  sensation  that  Jesus  Christ  has  been  per- 
sonally with  us  all  the  time.  If  it  were  only  a  human  agency 
I  should  feel  a  certain  trepidation  lest,  by  want  of  preparation 
or  care  in  myself,  the  mission  might  fail  in  its  last  effort ;  but 
I  have  no  fear,  because  He  who  has  done  such  extraordinary 
things  for  us  can  operate  without  human  agency  at  all.  We 
know  that  that  Presence  cannot  be  resisted.  Of  course  the 
message  or  the  effect  can,  but  nothing  can  stop  the  strong 
spiritual  Person  working  among  us  in  the  person  of  the  Spirit." 

This  is  the  great  mysterious  truth  to  which  the  devout  Church- 
man and  Nonconformist  can  alike  testify — that  Christ  is  present 
and  in  power  among  His  people.  This  it  is  that  has  inspired 
such  enthusiastic  love  and  devotion  in  all  ages  of  the  Church. 

A  visitor  once  ventured  to  ask  Alfred  Tennyson  what  he 
thought  of  our  Saviour.  They  were  walking  in  a  garden.  The 
poet  was  silent  for  a  moment.  Then  he  stopped  by  a  beautiful 
flower,  and  pointing  to  it,  said :  "  What  the  sun  is  to  that 
flower,  Jesus  Christ  is  to  my  soul." 

But  to  return  to  the  difficulties  which  beset  man  as  to  the 
Scriptures.  Criticism  that  has  acted  as  a  corrosive  acid  upon 
the  Old  Testament  has  also  assailed  the  Gospels. 

According  to  the  doctrine  of  the  Incarnation,  the  divine  and 
the  human  are  united.    What  is  divine  is  infallible  truth  and 
1  The  Farringdons  (London,  1902),  p.  114. 


374 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


imperishable,  what  is  human  is  subject  to  the  frailty  of  humanity 
and  is  evanescent.  It  has  been  pointed  out  that  in  the  Gospels 
there  are  slight  discrepancies.  There  must  be  such,  because 
written  down  by  men.  The  Gospels  are  the  memorabilia  of  the 
Apostles,  and  in  S.  Luke  of  the  Virgin  Mother,  existing  origin- 
ally in  scraps,  afterwards  pieced  together,  and  eventually  put 
into  the  form  in  which  we  have  them,  as  the  first  three  Gospels. 
There  are  in  them,  possibly,  inaccuracies  in  arrangement  of  facts, 
and  they  do  not  always  accord  in  minute  details.  This  is  due 
to  variations  in  the  reminiscences  of  the  narrators.1  But  sub- 
stantially they  give  us  a  true  report,  and  it  is  with  the  substance 
we  are  concerned — the  great  foundation  facts.  It  is  the  same 
with  the  Church :  she  has  her  divine  inspiration,  but  the  human 
element  is  in  her  very  strong.  Consequently,  whereas  sub- 
stantially she  is  the  quod  semper  quod  ubique  quod  ab  omnibus 
in  her  teaching  and  in  her  order  and  ministration,  she  is  subject 
to  faults  and  failings. 

The  Broad  Churchmen  of  the  advanced  type  more  or  less 
openly  display  their  unbelief  in  the  fundamentals  of  Christianity  ; 
not  too  openly,  lest  they  should  be  taxed  with  dishonesty  in 
holding  benefices.  The  dogma  of  the  Incarnation  is  held  but 
loosely  by  this  school.    The  tendency  is  to  deny  it  altogether. 

Hence  the  Sacrifice  on  Calvary  loses  in  their  teaching  its 
atoning  efficacy.  Its  moral  lessons  are  dwelt  upon,  to  the  ex- 
clusion of  issues  of  far  deeper  importance.  Such  teachers  are 
unable  to  account  for  the  widespread  sense  of  sin  and  need  for 
forgiveness  felt  by  mankind.  They  cannot  understand  the 
former  nor  satisfy  the  latter.  To  them  sin  has  no  real  existence ; 
it  is  a  sentiment,  a  spiritual  headache,  which  the  healthy  breeze 
of  common  sense  will  dissipate.  In  the  language  of  modern 
philosophy,  of  which  they  are  the  expositors,  "  The  higher  man 
of  the  day  is  not  worrying  himself  about  his  sins  at  all."  The 

1  Eusebius  quotes  from  S.  Clement  of  Alexandria:  "Peter  having 
publicly  preached  the  Word  at  Rome,  and  having  spoken  the  Gospel  by 
the  Spirit,  many  present  exhorted  Mark  to  write  the  things  which  had 
been  spoken,  since  he  had  long  accompanied  Peter,  and  remembered 
what  he  had  said  ;  and  that  when  he  had  composed  the  Gospel,  he  de- 
livered it  to  them  who  had  asked  it  of  him.  Which,  when  Peter  knew,  he 
neither  forbad  nor  encouraged  it."  (H.E.  vi.  14.)  Now  if  this  be  a  true 
tradition,  it  shows  that  in  the  Apostle's  eyes — though  the  details  of  our 
Lord's  life,  the  miracles  and  the  parables,  might  be  of  extraordinary 
interest  to  Christians,  the  knowledge  of  them  was  by  no  means  essential. 
That  which  was  essential  was  the  recognition  of  the  fundamental  verities 
— the  Incarnation,  the  Atoning  Death,  the  Resurrection,  and  the  Ascen- 
sion, and  the  moral  and  eschatological  teaching  of  Christ. 


THE  BROAD  CHURCH 


375 


Atonement  is  with  these  men  no  remedy  for  the  Fall,  because 
the  Fall  itself  is  nothing  but  a  fable.  The  doctrine  of  original 
sin  is  "  simply  comic."  Actual  sin,  so  long  as  it  does  not  con- 
flict with  the  social  standard  of  morality,  is  non-existent,  or,  at 
the  utmost,  is  a  temporary  survival  of  a  former  and  lower  stage 
of  culture.  Of  guilt  attaching  to  the  individual  there  is  none — 
it  is  the  fault  of  his  surroundings,  or  due  to  a  hereditary  taint. 

Such  teaching  is  not  only  opposed  to  the  doctrine  of  the 
Atonement,  but  it  robs  the  individual  of  conscience.  It  makes 
repentance,  which  is  the  first  step  towards  higher  and  better 
things,  needless,  and  renders  futile  all  efforts  of  amendment,  since 
it  removes  that  which  alone  can  make  those  efforts  successful. 

The  Incarnation  is  the  basis  of  the  Christian  Faith.  I  am 
well  aware  that  the  notion  of  the  virginal  birth  presents  diffi- 
culties that  must  be  respected. 

In  most  heathen  religions  there  was  a  belief  in  a  virginal 
conception,  apart  from  the  ordinary  process  of  nature.  There 
is  to  the  imagination  of  man  something  so  transcendental,  so 
exquisitely  beautiful  and  clean,  in  the  thought  of  a  pure  maiden, 
and  again,  something  so  lovely,  so  tender  and  touching  in  that 
of  the  mother  with  her  babe,  that  there  has  been  an  instinctive 
tendency  to  combine  the  two  ideas.  We  find  it  in  the  Popol 
Vuh,  the  sacred  book  of  the  Quiches,  in  the  Kalwiopog  of  the 
Esths,  in  classic  mythology  in  the  stories  of  the  birth  of  Vulcan 
from  Juno,  in  those  of  Cceculus,  Erigone,  and  Hebe.1  The  sun 
before  it  rises  has  foregleams,  and  flushes  the  clouds. 

But  either  we  must  accept  the  possibility  of  miracle  or  not. 
If  not,  then  the  creeds  must  be  revised  out  of  existence,  and  the 
whole  fabric  of  historical  Christianity  falls  to  the  ground.  If 
we  do  accept  the  possibility,  then  there  is  no  greater  difficulty 
about  the  foundation-miracle  of  Christianity  than  about  any 
other.  It  is  simply  a  matter  of  the  unbroken  tradition  of  the 
Church  corroborated  by  the  evidence  of  Holy  Scripture.  In 
most  heathen  religions,  as  said  above,  there  have  been  a  yearning 
and  an  aspiration  after  a  virginal  birth.  But  how  different 
are  these  cases  from  the  Gospel  narrative  of  the  birth  of  Jesus, 
with  the  whole  superstructure  of  the  Catholic  Church  built  on 
"  Jesus  and  the  Resurrection." 

With  regard  to  the  Atonement,  we  suffer  from  the  exaggera- 
tions of  the  doctrine  by  the  Evangelicals  who  represented  a 

1  See,  for  examples  from  all  parts  of  the  world,  from  nearly  all  religions — 
Sepp,  Das  Heidenthum  (Regensburg,  1853),  iii.  55,  59. 


376 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


wrathful  God  whose  anger  must  be  assuaged  by  sacrifice,  and 
those  who  doubt  it  may  say  with  Augustine:  "  I  barked  not 
against  Thy  truth,  but  against  fictions  of  carnal  men,  which 
I  mistook  for  Thy  truth.' ' 

When  there  is  a  sense  of  sin,  there  is  a  craving  for  its  expia- 
tion. With  a  denial  of  the  existence  of  sin  comes  disbelief  in 
the  Atonement. 

The  advanced  Broad  Churchman  of  the  present  day  has  but 
a  hesitating  belief,  if  he  has  any  at  all,  in  the  Incarnation. 
The  Virginal  Birth  is  dubious.  Moreover,  the  Crucifixion  is  to 
him  an  historical  fact,  nothing  further.  If  in  Orders,  what  mes- 
sage has  he  to  take  to  his  parishioners  ?  He  is  a  messenger 
without  a  message,  a  post-office  employe  flourishing  an  orange 
envelope  with  no  telegram  inside.  He  holds  the  Christian 
verities  with  as  tremulous  and  uncertain  a  hand  as  does  a 
partially  paralysed  man  when  attempting  to  put  a  cup  to  his 
lips.    And  he  is  spiritually  paralysed,  for  he  has  lost  his  Faith. 

Of  what  do  the  sermons  of  these  men  consist  ?  They  are 
lectures  on  Browning  or  the  housing  of  the  poor  and  other 
social  subjects,  on  anything  but  doctrine,  and  they  are  cautiously 
evasive  on  Evangelical  truths,  so  that  it  is  not  easy  to  catch 
their  preachers  and  put  salt  on  their  tails.  But  look  at  such 
men  as  the  late  Father  Stanton,  who  for  fifty  years,  as  a  humble 
curate,  could  draw  weekly  crowds  of  men ;  look  at  the  present 
Bishop  of  London,  who  can  fill  a  cathedral  with  attentive 
listeners,  by  preaching,  not  with  enticing  words,  or  words  of 
man's  wisdom,  but  the  simple  Gospel. 

When  I  was  a  little  boy  of  eight  years  old,  I  told  my  father 
a  lie.  I  was  miserable.  I  crept  into  the  room  where  he  sat  in 
his  arm-chair.  I  jumped  on  his  knees,  put  my  arms  round  his 
neck,  sobbed  on  his  breast,  and  confessed  my  sin.  He  embraced 
and  forgave  me.  So  we  say  to  our  penitents  :  Go  to  the  Eternal 
Father,  confess  to  Him,  and  trust  that  the  everlasting  arms 
will  enfold  you,  and  forgiveness  will  be  freely  given.  Can  the 
Broad  Churchman  do  this  ?  I  doubt  it.  I  doubt  it  because 
it  is  no  work  of  his  to  rouse  souls  to  the  consciousness  of  sin 
and  need  for  repentance.  I  do  not  think  it,  for  his  moral  sense 
must  be  blunted  when  he  recites  the  "  I  believe  "  without  be- 
lieving— and  for  what  ?  The  quarterage  from  the  Ecclesiastical 
Commissioners,  the  price  of  equivocation. 

Beyond  the  limits  of  the  English  Provinces  the  party  is  neg- 
ligible.   It  had  its  Bishop  Colonso,  and  a  backing  up  by  the 


THE  BROAD  CHURCH 


377 


State  in  South  Africa,  and  it  died  of  inanition.  It  has  con- 
tributed nothing  towards  the  spiritual  life  of  the  Church,  because 
it  is  lacking  in  spirituality.  Questions  connected  with  the 
higher  criticism  or  abstract  theological  arguments  are  out  of 
place  in  teaching  intended  for  the  multitude.  This  they  feel, 
and  so  their  pulpit  utterances  are  confined  to  social  questions  or 
to  mere  morality.  But  this  is  a  state  of  things  fraught  with 
danger  to  religion. 

Broad  Churchism  appeals  mainly  to  college  tutors  and  school- 
masters— men  who  have  but  little  knowledge  of  human  nature, 
its  wants  and  aspirations.  It  has,  as  well,  its  adherents  among 
the  social  reformers  who  limit  their  activities  to  the  improve- 
ment of  the  conditions  under  which  the  working  classes  live  ; 
who  imagine  that  all  that  is  needed  are  education,  better  domestic 
arrangements,  cheap  food  and  recreation,  physical  and  mental ; 
in  a  word,  material  amelioration.  They  are  satisfied  if  they  can 
make  the  environment  pleasant,  never  thinking  of  the  higher 
interests  of  the  organization  that  it  surrounds.  Reason  is  the 
supplanter  of  faith.  Faith  is,  in  fact,  a  faculty  of  the  soul  they 
do  not  seem  to  possess  or  understand  ;  never  exercised,  it 
becomes  atrophied. 

In  the  Atlantic  is  a  tract  left  undisturbed  by  the  currents — 
that  is,  torpid — called  the  Sargasso  Sea.  The  Gulf  Stream  pours 
past,  carrying  warmth  to  northern  regions  of  Europe,  even  to 
Nova  Zembla,  and  the  south  equatorial  current  is  streaming 
past,  conveying  chilled  waters  to  be  heated  in  the  Mexican  basin. 
But  in  the  Sargasso  Sea  all  is  still ;  it  breeds  a  festering  mass 
of  vegetation  and  animalcules.  As  in  the  ballad  of  the  "  Ancient 
Mariner  "  : 

Day  after  day,  day  after  day, 

We  stuck,  nor  breath  nor  motion, 

As  idle  as  a  painted  ship 

Upon  a  painted  ocean. 

Water,  water,  everywhere, 

And  all  the  boards  did  shrink  ; 

Water,  water,  everywhere, 

Nor  any  drop  to  drink. 

The  very  deep  did  rot.    O  Christ, 

That  ever  this  should  be ! 

Yes,  slimy  things  did  crawl  with  legs 

Upon  the  slimy  sea. 

Broad  Churchism  is  the  Sargasso  Sea  of  the  Church.  In  London 
the  men  of  this  party  have  their  churches  and  proprietary  chapels, 


378 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


and  these  are  attended  by  individuals  who  have  sufficient  salt 
of  their  youth  to  lead  them  to  attend  worship  on  Sunday  morn- 
ings when  they  cannot  conveniently  get  up  a  party  for  a  motor 
excursion.  When  such  clerics  get  transferred  to  country  livings 
they  do  not  know  what  to  preach  about  ;  how  to  comfort  the 
sick  and  sorrowful  and  how  to  reclaim  the  sinful.  Christ 
Jesus  is  the  friend,  the  dear  friend,  the  hope,  the  standby  of  the 
suffering :  but  He  is  only  the  bowing  acquaintance  of  the 
Broad  Church  pastor  ;  they  are  hardly  on  speaking  terms. 

I  remember  reading  of  a  philosophic  agnostic  who  was  visit- 
ing his  old  nurse  at  an  almshouse.  She  was  suffering,  crippled, 
and  fading.  He  spoke  to  her  of  one  thing  after  another — 
how  that  rheumatism  was  due  to  uric  acid  in  the  blood  ;  but 
the  thought  of  uric  acid  did  not  comfort  her.  Just  then  the 
chaplain  passed,  and  seeing  the  aged  creature  with  tears  stream- 
ing down  her  cheeks,  he  held  up  his  finger,  pointing  heavenwards. 
The  old  nurse  smiled,  her  face  brightened,  and  she  dried  her 
eyes.  "  There,"  remarked  the  writer  who  narrated  this  fact, 
"  I  found  that  we  lack  something  to  give  which  so  far  only 
Christian  faith  can  accord." 

Many  years  ago  I  was  at  Freiburg  in  Breisgau,  where  at  that 
time  resided  an  English  governess,  who  was  dying  of  cancer. 
Her  German  Protestant  pupils  visited  her.  They  were  kind 
souls,  and  read  to  her  Schiller,  Heine,  and  Goethe  ;  but  could 
afford  her  no  comfort,  instil  into  her  no  hope.  Then  she  sent 
for  the  English  chaplain,  and  he  spoke  to  her  of  Christ,  His 
Cross  and  His  Resurrection.  The  sun  shone  out  on  that  poor 
sufferer's  last  days  ;  she  had  the  Gospel  of  hope,  of  immortality ; 
she  had  Jesus  Christ,  God  and  man,  who  had  died  on  the  Cross 
and  had  conquered  death,  to  cling  to  in  place  of  Schiller's  "  Diver," 
Goethe's  "  Faust,"  and  Heine's  "  Atta  Troll."  "  Oh,"  exclaimed 
the  pupils,  "  she  has  gone  back  to  superstition." 

I  will  take  another  case  and  submit  it  to  the  Broad  Church 
cleric,  as  one  might  to  a  medical  man,  and  ask  what  treatment 
he  would  adopt.  And  I  take  it  from  Miss  E.  Thorneycroft 
Fowler's  novel  The  Farringdons.  I  take  it  because  it  is  an  exact 
reproduction  of  what  has  been  the  experience  of  thousands  of 
Roman  and  Anglican  priests,  and  of  Wesleyan  ministers  as 
well,  and  each  one  of  them  has  known  at  once  what  medicine 
to  apply. 

The  authoress  is  speaking  of  Jemima  Stubbs,  whose  early 
years  were  devoted  to  attendance  upon  an  ailing  mother,  and 


THE  BROAD  CHURCH 


379 


later  on  a  crippled  brother.  She  is  addressed  by  Caleb  Bateson, 
a  class-leader  and  occasional  preacher  among  the  Methodists. 

"  You  don't  seem  to  be  enjoying  yourself,  my  lass,"  he  had 
said  in  his  cheery  voice,  laying  a  big  hand  upon  the  girl's  narrow 
shoulder. 

M  'And  how  should  I,  Mr.  Bateson,  not  having  a  beau,  nor 
nobody  to  talk  to  ?  '  she  replied  in  her  quavering  treble. 
'  What  with  havin'  first  mother  to  nurse  when  I  was  a  little 
gell,  and  then  havin'  Johnnie  to  look  after,  I've  never  had  time 
to  make  myself  look  pretty  and  to  get  a  beau,  like  other  gells, 
and  now  I'm  too  old  for  that  sort  of  thing,  and  yet  I've  never 
had  my  chance,  as  you  may  say.' 

"  1  Poor  lass  !    It's  a  hard  life  as  you've  had,  and  no  mistake.' 

"  'That  it  is,  Mr.  Bateson.  Men  wants  gells  to  look  pretty 
and  make  'em  laugh.  They  don't  care  for  the  dull,  dowdy  ones 
such  as  me — and  yet,  how  is  a  gell  to  be  light-hearted  and  gay, 
I  should  like  to  know,  when  it's  work,  work,  work  all  the  day  ; 
nursing,  nursing,  nursing  all  the  night  ?  Yet  the  men  don't 
make  no  allowance  for  that,  not  they.  They  just  see  as  a  gell 
is  plain  and  stupid,  and  then  they  has  nothing  more  to  do  with 
her  and  she  can  go  to  Jericho  for  all  they  cares.' 

"  '  You've  had  a  bad  time  of  it,  my  lass,'  repeated  Bateson  in 
his  full,  deep  voice. 

"  '  Right  you  are,  Mr.  Bateson,  and  it's  made  my  hair  grey, 
and  my  face  all  wrinkles,  and  my  hands  a  sight  o'  roughness  and 
ugliness.  I'm  a  regular  old  woman  and  a  fright,  and  I'm  but 
thirty-five,  though  no  one  'ud  believe  it  to  look  on  me.  Lots  o* 
women,  them  as  has  had  easy  times,  and  their  way  made  smooth 
for  them,  look  little  more  than  gells  when  they  are  thirty-five, 
and  the  men  run  after  them  as  fast  as  if  they  was  only  twenty. 
But  I'm  an  old  woman,  I  am,  and  I've  never  had  time  to  be  a 
young  one,  and  I've  never  had  a  beau.' 

"  1  It  seems  now,  Jemima,  as  if  the  Lord  was  dealing  a  bit 
hard  with  you,  but  never  fret  yourself,  He'll  explain  it  all,  and 
make  it  all  up  to  you  in  His  own  good  time.  My  lass,  do  you 
remember  how  S.  Paul  said,  "  From  henceforth  let  no  man 
trouble  me,  for  I  bear  in  my  body  the  marks  of  the  Lord  Jesus  "  ? 
Now  it  seems  to  me  that  your  grey  hair  and  your  wrinkles 
and  the  roughness  that  comes  to  you,  when  we  are  working  for 
others,  and  doing  our  duty,  are  nothing  more  nor  less  than  the 
marks  of  the  Lord  Jesus.  There  are  lots  o'  men  in  this  world, 
Jemima,  and  still  more  women,  who  grow  old  before  their  time, 


380 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


working  for  other  people,  and  I  take  it  that  when  folks  talk  o' 
their  wrinkles,  the  Lord  says,  "  My  Name  shall  be  on  their  fore- 
heads ;  "  and  when  folks  talk  o'  their  grey  hairs,  He  says, 
"  They  shall  walk  with  Me  in  white,  for  they  are  worthy."  And 
why  do  we  mark  the  things  that  belong  to  us  ?  Why,  so  as  we 
may  know  'em  again  and  can  claim  'em  as  our  own  afore  the 
whole  world.  And  that  is  just  why  the  Lord  marks  us,  so  as 
all  the  world  should  know  we  are  His,  and  so  as  no  man  shall 
ever  pluck  us  out  of  His  hand.' 

"  Jemima  looked  gratefully  up  at  the  kindly  prophet  who 
was  trying  to  comfort  her.  '  Law  !  Mr.  Bateson.  That's  a 
consoling  way  of  looking  at  things.  But  all  the  same,  I'd  have 
liked  to  have  a  beau  of  my  own  just  for  onst,  like  other  gells.' 

"  '  The  Lord  made  women,  and  He  understands  'em,  and  He 
ain't  the  one  to  blame  'em  for  being  as  He  Himself  made  'em. 
Remember, the  Book  says,  "  As  onewhom  his  mother  comforteth," 
and  I  hold  that  means  as  He  understands  women  and  their 
troubles  better  than  the  kindest  father  ever  could.  And  He 
won't  let  His  children  give  up  things  for  His  sake,  without 
paying  them  back  some  thirty,  some  sixty,  and  some  an  hundred- 
fold, and  don't  you  ever  get  thinking  that  He  will. '  " 

This  is  a  long  quotation,  but  I  give  it  as  typical  of  situations 
in  which  a  clergyman  will  be  placed,  conditions  he  will  have 
to  meet. 

Now,  Messieurs  les  Modernistes,  look  round  your  pharma- 
copoeia and  see  whether  you  have  any  medicine  for  such  a  case. 
If  you  repeat  the  old  words  of  consolation,  it  will  be  as  gramo- 
phones grinding  out  in  harsh  notes  a  melody  which  you  do  not 
hold  to  be  true,  do  not  feel  to  be  true,  to  which  you  are  as 
insensible  as  the  revolving  disc  on  which  the  notes  are  lightly 
scored. 

Where  in  the  mission  field  are  the  Broad  Churchmen  to 
be  found  ?  Low  Churchmen  are  there,  with  their  truncated 
Gospel ;  High  Churchmen  are  there  ;  the  Wesleyan,  the  Inde- 
pendent, the  Baptist  are  there — but  the  Broad  Churchman  is 
absent,  because  he  has  nothing  to  give,  no  glad  tidings  of  great 
joy  to  announce  to  the  heathen.  In  the  slums,  by  the  sick-bed, 
by  the  starving,  he  is  not  found.  He  has  nothing  to  give  them. 
No  Gospel,  no  glad  tidings  of  great  joy.  Among  the  sinful,  the 
fallen,  the  agonized  souls — he  is  not  found.  He  looks  on  the 
sufferer  and  passes  by  on  the  other  side.  He  has  no  Gospel, 
no  glad  tidings  of  pardon  and  peace  for  them. 


THE  BROAD  CHURCH  381 

At  a  recent  Wesleyan  Conference  held  at  Plymouth  (July  1913), 
a  Mr.  Ensor  Walters,  addressing  the  assembly,  expressed  his 
belief  that  the  future  is  with  the  dogmatic  Churches.  Speaking 
for  London,  at  all  events,  he  said  that  sensational  evangelizers 
had  gone  for  ever.  The  churches  in  inner  East  London  that 
were  full,  if  any  were  full,  were  those  of  the  Roman  Catholic  and 
High  Anglican  Communions.  He  was  not  there  to  plead  that 
these  Communions  alone  had  the  truth,  but  they  had  said  to  a 
weary  and  restless  world,  "  Thus  saith  the  Lord." 

We  have  but  to  cross  the  water  and  study  the  Evangelische 
Kirche  of  Prussia,  of  Wiirtemberg  and  Baden,  to  see  to  what 
a  condition  of  religious  deadness  an  all-but-creedless  Church 
can  sink.1 

On  the  stagnation  of  this  Church,  which  was  an  invention  of 
King  Frederick  William  III  of  Prussia  in  1817,  I  might  refer 
to  Laing's  Notes  of  a  Traveller  (1842),  an  impartial  evidence, 
as  he  was  a  Scottish  Presbyterian  ;  but  I  prefer  to  take  a  later 
testimony.  It  must  be  understood  what  this  Evangelical 
Church  is — it  is  a  fusion  of  Lutheranism  and  Calvinism  on  an 
undenominational  basis.  When  this  vague  religion  was  imposed 
on  Wiirtemberg,  1,500  families  migrated  with  the  purpose  of 
settling  in  Georgia.  Two-thirds  of  them  perished  before  reach- 
ing Odessa,  where  the  remnant  were  reinforced  by  a  further 
body  of  their  countrymen,  to  the  number  of  100  families.  The 
Emperor  Alexander  I  established  them  in  colonies  about  Tiflis 
and  Elizabethopol,  where  their  descendants  remain  to  this  day. 

As  to  the  condition  of  religion  in  this  "  Church  "  on  an  almost 
creedless  basis,  I  will  quote  the  words  of  Dr.  Bruckner:  "  It 
must  not  be  concealed  that  the  great  part  of  the  Protestant 
population  is  at  variance  with  the  Protestant  Church.  Even 
when  outward  opposition  is  not  expressed,  inward  declension  is 
not  lacking.  If  the  prevailing  disposition  of  the  age  is  not  an 
irreligious  one,  it  certainly  is  not  on  the  whole  a  Church  one. 
I  will  not  inquire  whether  the  Bishop  of  Paderborn  is  right 

1  It  does  retain  the  Apostles'  Creed,  but  this  is  only  used  at  Baptisms 
and  Confirmations.  Nothing  but  the  personal  interference  of  the  Em- 
peror William — a  man  of  eighty — as  Summits  Episcopus  prevented  the 
Apostles'  Creed  from  being  struck  out  of  the  Prussian  Liturgy  in  1877, 
by  the  vote  of  the  Consistories.  The  same  took  place  at  Baden,  where 
it  would  have  been  expunged  by  vote  of  the  pastors,  but  for  the  veto  of 
the  Grand  Duke.  Although  the  Creed  stands  in  the  baptismal  formulary, 
an  eminent  pastor  in  Baden  told  me  in  1878  that  he  did  not  fancy  there 
were  half  a  dozen  in  the  Grand  Duchy  who  used  it.  It  was  optional  to 
the  parents  whether  it  should  be  recited  or  not. 


382 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


when  he  affirms  that  he  knows  of  Protestant  towns  of  18,000 
inhabitants  in  which  only  about  thirty-two  churchgoers  are  to 
be  found.  But  it  is  a  fact  that,  in  a  town  such  as  Berlin,  with 
its  population  of  65,000  inhabitants,  the  existing  churches  can 
accommodate  40,000,  and  that  these  are  said  to  be  seldom 
filled."  1 

I  do  not  give  my  own  experiences,  as  I  might  be  considered 
prejudiced.  In  the  Sunday  Magazine  of  1870  is  an  article  on 
Tubingen,  the  University  in  which  are  trained  those  who  are 
to  be  pastors  in  the  Evangelical  Church  of  Wurtemberg.  The 
writer  says  : 

"  When  we  leave  the  class  rooms,  which  are  crowded  by 
earnest  and  accomplished  young  men — we  seem  to  have  left, 
not  theology  only,  but  religion  behind  us.  In  the  Stift-Kirche 
(where  almost  all  the  worshippers  go)  you  do  not  on  any  Sunday 
morning  see  above  a  hundred  and  fifty  of  the  eight  hundred 
and  odd  students  who  are  enrolled  in  the  University.  You  can 
count  on  your  fingers  all  who  occupy  the  seats  of  the  male 
citizens.  That  intelligent  and  courteous  man  with  whom  you 
walked  yesterday  among  the  vineyards  is  not  there  ;  nor  any 
other  with  whom  you  had  some  talk  on  politics ;  nor  any  of 
those  whose  faces  are  familiar  to  you  in  the  streets.  Stranger 
still,  you  will  see  very  few  of  the  professors  ;  you  may  go  to 
church  for  a  whole  summer  and  never  see  Professor  Beck.  Aye, 
and  stranger  still,  that  good  lady  with  whom  it  was  your  privi- 
lege to  have  had  Christian  conversation,  and  whose  humble  and 
loving  trust  in  Christ  impressed  you  so  much,  is  not  there.  It 
was  her  manly  son  and  his  friends  whom  you  saw  pass  your 
window  very  early  this  morning,  setting  out  for  a  long  walk 
amongst  the  hills.  If,  in  your  amazement,  you  devote  Monday 
to  inquiries,  you  will  find  that  public  worship  is  not  regarded  as 
their  duty  by  any  of  the  most  pious  among  your  friends  ;  and 
you  will  learn  that  many  of  the  most  thoughtful  men  and  most 
inquiring  students  have  long  ceased  even  to  expect  any  good 
from  churchgoing.    You  will  find,  on  the  whole,  that  the  most 

1  "  Never  did  I  behold  Sunday  so  ill-observed  as  in  these  Protestant 
cities  of  North  Germany.  From  sunrise  to  sunset,  thousands  of  the 
people  are  absorbed  in  one  idea,  that  of  pleasure.  Setting  all  other 
observances  aside,  it  is  neither  a  day  of  rest  to  man  nor  beast.  The 
churches  are  ill  filled.  We  attended  the  Lutheran  (Evangelical,  actually) 
service  at  the  Marien-Kirche  (Liibeck)  this  morning,  a  service  I  particu- 
larly dislike — a  standing  and  sitting  congregation — much  singing,  little 
praying,  and  a  long-winded  sermon."  Horace  Marryat,  A  Residence  in 
Jutland  (i860),  i.  5. 


THE  BROAD  CHURCH 


383 


pious  people  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  most  intellectual  on  the 
other,  and  those  who  may  be  said  to  belong  to  both  classes,  do 
not  attend  church  in  Tubingen.  If  you  proceed  to  country 
parishes  you  will  probably  find  the  church  well  attended,  but 
you  will  not  find  that  its  services  have  much  influence  on  the 
daily  life  of  the  farmers  and  cotters  ;  you  will  not  even  find  that 
the  minister  holds  that  place  spiritually  and  socially  among  his 
people  to  which  he  seems  so  well  entitled.  You  will  be  struck 
probably  in  church  itself,  certainly  out  of  it,  by  the  lack  of 
sympathy  between  the  pulpit  and  the  pews,  the  manse  and  the 
houses  of  the  parishioners.  It  is  unquestionable  that  this  is 
due  to  a  want  of  living  religion.  If  a  political  revolution  were 
to  occur  to-morrow,  the  throne  is  not  so  sure  to  be  cast  into  the 
mire  as  is  the  pulpit  ;  and  be  it  remembered  that  we  speak  of 
a  country  where  there  is  no  dissenting  church — where  the  con- 
test would  not  be  between  Establishment  and  Nonconformity, 
but,  in  the  first  instance  at  least,  between  Church  and 
no- Church. 

"  To  what  then  is  due  that  strange  alienation  of  the  people 
from  the  Church  ?  It  seems  to  me  that  it  comes  chiefly  from 
.  .  .  the  negative  theology  which,  while  it  has  lost  its  hold  on 
at  the  best  men  and  the  best  thinkers,  while  as  a  school  it  is 
attempting  to  make  up  by  extravagance  what  it  has  lost 
in  power,  has  passed  down  into  the  heart  of  the  people  and 
chilled  it." 

This  testimony  is  valuable,  for  it  comes  from  the  pen  of  a 
thoroughgoing  Protestant.  Confirmation  may  be  found  in 
Religious  Thought  in  Germany  (Tinsley,  1870). 

There  is,  undoubtedly,  a  sad  decline  in  churchgoing  in  Eng- 
land, but  there  is,  among  us,  a  large  body  of  enthusiastic  wor- 
shippers who  could  not  and  would  not  let  the  Church  go,  whereas 
in  Protestant  Germany  only  a  few  women  would  be  found  who 
would  care  to  lift  a  finger  to  save  the  Evangelische  Kirche  from 
sinking  into  the  earth ;  and  professors  and  students  would 
drink  a  bock  with  a  "  Hoch  !  Hoch  !  Hoch  !  "  above  its  grave, 
and  the  German  people  would  look  on  with  supreme  indifference. 

Here,  then,  we  have  an  undogmatic  Church,  a  compromise, 
before  us  as  an  acknowledged  failure  ;  and  yet  it  is  to  this  con- 
dition that  English  Latitudinarians  would  reduce  the  Anglican 
Church.  Religion  is  not  dead  in  Germany,  far  from  it;  but 
it  is  like  the  unsatisfied  craving  for  love  in  the  heart  of  an  aged 
spinster,  and  it  is  not  sought  in  the  Evangelical  Church  ;  I  do 


384 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


not  think  it  occurs  to  any  devout  minds  to  suppose  that  a  heart- 
satisfying  religion  is  to  be  found  there. 

There  is,  unquestionably,  great  inducement  to  a  Broad 
Church  clergyman  to  occupy  the  position  he  has  taken  up, 
because  it  pays  to  be  vague  and  vaporous.  It  ensures  advance- 
ment. It  is  worth  to  him  some  thousand  a  year.  It  is  the 
popular  current  on  which  he  floats.  But  assuredly  a  priest  of 
God  should  not  follow  the  line  of  least  resistance,  and  take  his 
religion  from  the  fashion  of  the  day. 

There  used  to  be  carriages  to  which  was  attached  a  "  rumble  " 
behind,  in  which  sat  the  lady's  maid.  The  Broad  Churchman 
seats  himself  in  the  body  of  the  ecclesiastical  coach,  among 
soft  cushions,  and  where  is  the  luncheon  basket  with  cold  pheasant, 
jam  puffs,  and  champagne,  also  pleasant  female  society.  We 
once  drove  over  Haldon  from  Exeter  to  Dawlish,  and  only 
on  reaching  our  destination  discovered  that  the  rumble  had  fallen 
off  with  the  maid  in  it.  I  fear  that  with  most  Broad  Church- 
men their  religion  is  consigned  to  the  rumble  behind,  and  that 
they  will  not  discover  their  loss  till  the  end  of  life's  journey. 

With  men  of  the  old  Evangelical  school,  a  High  Churchman 
can  always  have  much  in  common.  So  can  he  with  an  earnest 
Dissenting  minister.  They  have  in  their  hearts  the  love  of 
God,  and  more  or  less  of  the  Faith.  But  it  is  otherwise  with 
the  Broad  Church  parson.  Though  we  can  quite  realize  how 
great  have  been  his  difficulties,  still  we  cannot  but  feel  that  he 
ought  not  to  occupy  the  place  he  does.  One  is  separated  from 
him  by  a  wall,  because  we  cannot  regard  him  as  an  honest  man. 
If  scholars  desire  to  investigate  the  credibility  of  the  Virginal 
Birth  and  the  Resurrection,  let  them  step  outside  the  Church ; 
but  to  dispute  or  disbelieve  in  them,  and  to  continue  to  hold  a 
position  and  pocket  its  emoluments,  whilst  definitely  protest- 
ing twice  daily  that  they  do  believe  in  these  articles,  is  to  be 
blind  to  the  dictates  of  that  integrity  which  is  to  be  expected  of 
gentlemen.  The  old  Broad  Churchmen,  such  as  Dr.  Arnold 
and  Maurice  and  Kingsley,  were  men  of  different  type.  Arnold, 
though  bitterly  hostile  to  the  Oxford  Movement,  which  he 
attacked  with  a  pen  dipped  in  gall,  was  an  earnest  teacher,  and 
his  sermons  to  the  boys  at  Rugby  were  marked  by  devotion  to 
our  Blessed  Lord.  At  one  time  he  had  strong  Unitarian  lean- 
ings, but  these  he  certainly  mastered.  In  a  letter  addressed 
to  a  Unitarian  father  who  had  sent  his  son  to  Rugby  he  pro- 
tested that  such  tenets  were  irreconcilable  with  the  essentials 


THE  BROAD  CHURCH 


385 


of  Christianity,  and  expressed  his  determination  as  a  master 
to  try  to  impress  on  this  boy,  as  on  all  other  pupils  committed 
to  his  charge,  belief  in  these  solemn  verities  ;  and  the  father, 
after  such  a  warning,  must  resolve  whether  he  would  allow  the 
boy  to  stay.  This  is  what  he  wrote  to  Dr.  Greenhill :  "I 
believe  that  any  man  can  make  himself  an  atheist  speedily,  by 
breaking  off  his  own  personal  communion  with  God  in  Christ ; 
but  if  he  keep  this  unimpaired,  I  believe  that  no  intellectual 
study,  whether  of  nature  or  of  man,  will  force  him  into  atheism  ; 
but  on  the  contrary,  the  new  creations  of  our  knowledge,  so 
to  speak,  gather  themselves  into  a  fair  and  harmonious  system, 
ever  revolving  in  their  brightness  around  their  proper  centre, 
the  throne  of  God.  Prayer  and  kindly  intercourse  with  the 
poor  are  the  two  great  safeguards  of  spiritual  life — its  more  than 
food  and  raiment." 

It  was  on  such  topics  as  the  Church,  Orders,  and  Sacraments 
that  Arnold  laid  no  stress,  if  he  did  not  sometimes  contravene 
the  Prayer  Book. 

J.  F.  Denison  Maurice,  the  son  of  a  Unitarian  minister,  was 
also  regarded  as  pertaining  to  the  Broad  Church,  but  he  stoutly 
maintained  that  the  Catholic  Church  was  the  Kingdom  of 
Christ  upon  earth,  that  the  Sacraments  were  pledges  and 
guarantees  of  grace  ;  that  the  ministry  had  a  real  commission 
from  God.  His  teaching  was  not  fully  approved  by  the  Trac- 
tarians,  as  he  fell  short  of  much  on  which  they  insisted.  But 
of  his  sincerity,  of  his  loyalty  to  Christ  and  to  the  Church,  there 
can  be  entertained  no  doubt  whatever. 

Stanley,  Dean  of  Westminster,  was  the  nearest  to  the  modern 
Broad  Churchman.  He  was  a  thorough  Erastian,  regarding 
the  clergy  in  no  other  light  than  as  the  moral  police  force  of 
the  State  and  conservators  of  her  ancient  monuments.  His 
theological  views  were  vague,  and  it  is  doubtful  whether  he 
knew  himself  how  far  his  belief  went,  and  how  far  it  fell  short 
of  Socinianism.  I  met  him  at  the  Alt  Katholik  Congress  at 
Cologne  in  1872,  but  he  played  there  a  very  inconspicuous  part, 
as  Bishop  Wordsworth  of  Lincoln  was  present,  with  very  definite 
views,  and  it  became  obvious  to  Stanley  that  the  Old  Catholics 
were  determined  to  adhere  to  the  Creeds  and  maintain  the 
sacramental  teaching  of  the  Church. 

Mr.   (afterwards  Dean)   Church  wrote  of  Stanley  to  Mr. 
Mozley  in  1865  :  "He  seems  to  me  in  the  position  of  a  prophet 
and  leader,  full  of  eagerness  and  enthusiasm  and  brilliant  talents, 
25 


386 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


all  heightened  by  success — but  without  a  creed  to  preach."  In 
1881  he  wrote :  "  Stanley  had  intellectual  defects,  like  his 
physical  defects  as  to  music,  or  smell,  or  colour,  or  capacity 
for  mathematical  ideas,  which  crippled  his  capacity  for 
the  sympathy  he  wished  to  spread  all  round  him.  One  of 
these  defects  is  indicated  in  his  aversion  to  metaphysics  and 
dogmatic  statements.  They  were  to  his  mind  like  the  glass 
which  a  fly  walks  on  and  cannot  penetrate  ;  when  he  came  to 
them  his  mind  *  would  not  bite.'  Another  defect  seemed  to 
me  always  his  incapacity  for  the  spiritual  and  unearthly  side 
of  religion  ;  the  elevations  and  aspirations  after  Divine  affec- 
tions, and  longings  after  God,  which  are  above  the  historic  plane 
which  was  congenial  to  him.  These  were  two  enormous  dis- 
qualifications to  a  religious  teacher,  and  there  were  others, 
among  them  a  certain  freely  indulged  contempt  for  what  he  did 
not  like,  and  a  disposition  to  hunt  down  and  find  faults  where 
he  did  not  love  people." 

He  offered  a  gratuitous  insult  to  the  Bishops  of  the  Anglican 
Communion,  English,  Scottish,  Irish,  Colonial,  and  American, 
when  they  assembled  for  the  first  Pan-Anglican  Council,  by 
refusing  to  allow  them  to  hold  the  Conciliar  Communion  in  the 
Abbey.  On  the  other  hand,  when  the  revisionists  of  the  Eng- 
lish Bible  were  to  begin  their  labours,  though  comprising  Dis- 
senters and  a  Unitarian  minister,  he  invited  all  to  communion 
in  the  Abbey.  When  Convocation  met  on  July  5,  Bishop 
Wilberforce  spoke  on  what  was  then  called  the  "  Westminster 
Scandal."  "I  am  bound  to  say  that  I  deeply  lament  that 
any  one  professing  not  only  to  hold,  but  to  be  the  teacher  of,  a 
doctrine  so  dishonouring  to  our  Lord  and  Saviour  as  the  denial 
of  His  Godhead,  joined  in  that  act  of  Holy  Communion  of  our 
Church,  with  the  Bishops  of  that  Church.  I  do  most  deeply 
lament  that  such  should  have  been  the  case." 

If  Stanley  refused  the  use  of  the  Abbey  to  the  Bishops  of 
the  Anglican  Church,  he  was  ready  to  lend  the  pulpit  for  lay 
lectures.  Stanley  was  at  Canterbury  for  the  enthronement  of 
Archbishop  Tait  (I  take  the  story  from  the  Church  Quarterly 
Review).  Dean  Alford  was  worried  because  at  the  conclusion 
of  the  ceremony  the  Archbishop  is  enthroned  in  the  Dean's 
seat,  whence  he  would  give  the  final  Benediction,  facing  East, 
and  the  congregation  in  the  nave  would  see  and  hear  nothing 
of  the  blessing.  The  prospect  distressed  the  Dean,  and  some 
one  suggested,  "  Why  not  ask  him  to  say  it  twice  ?    Let  him 


THE  BROAD  CHURCH 


387 


step  out  of  his  stall,  stand  at  the  top  of  the  steps  and  bless  the 
multitude  outside,  papal  fashion,  urbi  et  orbi."  But  the 
Bishop  of  Oxford  started  some  technical  objection  of  precedent. 
At  this  Stanley  cut  in  with  the  happy  quotation,  his  eyes 
positively  twinkling  with  mischief,  "Hast  thou  but  one  blessing, 
my  father  ?  Bless  me,  even  me  also,  0  my  father  t "  "  Hark  at 
him,"  said  the  Bishop  promptly:  "  on  Esau's  side,  as  usual." 

The  Rev.  Canon  Fowler,  Vice-Principal  of  Bishop  Hatfield's 
Hall,  Durham,  many  years  ago,  went  to  Westminster  and  asked 
Dean  Stanley  to  allow  him  to  study  some  mediaeval  Hebrew 
documents ;  but,  seeing  his  long  coat  and  clerical  waistcoat  and 
collar,  the  Dean  treated  him  with  marked  coldness.  A  Jew 
scholar,  who  afterwards  went  for  the  same  purpose,  wrote 
to  Dr.  Fowler  to  express  how  courteous  and  gracious  the  Dean 
had  been  to  him,  allowing  him  to  have  the  documents  out 
of  the  library.  Such  was  Stanley.  He  contemplated  a  Church- 
man with  definite  faith,  from  a  distance,  and  with  inveterate 
dislike ;  but  would  receive  with  open  arms,  and  a  face  wreathed 
in  smiles,  a  Dissenter,  an  agnostic,  even  a  Jew. 

In  1 910  a  book  was  published  called  Confessions  of  a  Clergy- 
man. It  was  anonymous,  but  the  author  informs  his  readers 
that  he  is  a  beneficed  priest  of  the  Church  of  England,  but  that, 
although  he  has  lost  his  faith,  he  has  no  desire  to  lose  his  bene- 
fice and  its  emoluments,  and  therefore  writes  anonymously. 
He  wrote  :  "I  am  still  in  the  active  ministry  of  the  Church.  I 
see  no  reason  why  I  should  sever  this  connection ; "  and  yet  he 
says,  "  I  recognize  Jesus  as  my  Saviour,  but  I  do  not  recognize 
Him  as  my  God." 

When  Mr.  Stopford  Brooke  found  that  he  had  ceased  to 
believe  in  the  Apostles'  Creed,  he  resigned  his  benefice  like 
an  honest  man. 

There  can  be  no  manner  of  doubt  as  to  what  the  teaching  of 
the  Church  is,  relative  to  the  nature  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ ; 
and  to  remain  in  the  ministry  whilst  contravening  its  teaching 
on  a  fundamental  doctrine,  if  not  with  the  lips,  yet  in  the 
heart,  shows  how  the  loss  of  faith  has  demoralized  the 
conscience.  Yet  these  are  the  men  that  our  Prime  Ministers 
are  disposed  to  advance  to  deaneries  and  canonries  and  perhaps 
to  bishoprics.  It  is  much  as  though  dishonest  clerks  in  a 
bank,  who  falsified  the  accounts  and  purloined  the  cash,  were 
advanced  to  be  managers. 

Mr.   (now  Dean)  Hensley  Henson  in  his  Liberty  of  Pro- 


388 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


phesying  has  spoken  of  the  acute  conflict  between  the  modern 
intellect  and  conscience  and  the  Prayer  Book.  It  may  be  so, 
but  that  is  no  reason  why  we  should  make  over  our  treasure 
to  those  who  would  burgle  us  of  it. 

Such  as  hold  to  the  immutability  of  natural  law  would  re- 
strict the  efficacy  of  prayer  to  supplication  for  spiritual  graces. 
Inexorable  law  governs  the  world  of  human  affairs,  and  cannot 
be  deflected  to  one  side  or  another.  The  course  of  nature  is 
rigidly  mapped  out,  and  no  deviation  from  it  is  thinkable; 
consequently  such  supplications  as  occur  in  the  Prayer  Book 
for  rain  or  for  fine  weather  should  be  deleted.  If  the  Broad 
Churchmen's  conception  of  the  valuelessness  of  prayer  in  matters 
material  be  carried  to  its  logical  conclusion,  it  is  useless  to  pray 
for  the  recovery  of  the  sick,  for  release  from  pain,  because  a 
malady  must  take  its  course,  and  pain  is  a  necessary  con- 
comitant of  disorganization  of  the  system.  It  would  also  be 
irrational  to  pray  for  cessation  of  an  epidemic  "  in  the  Time 
of  any  common  Plague  or  Sickness,"  because  these  are  due  to 
the  drinking  water  being  impregnated  with  sewage,  or  to  some 
other  remediable  cause  ;  and  the  prayer  should  be  addressed  to 
the  sanitary  authorities  or  to  the  local  inspector  of  nuisances, 
not  to  the  Almighty,  in  whose  hands  it  is  commonly  supposed 
are  the  issues  of  life  and  death. 

It  is  on  the  same  ground  they  hold  it  to  be  quite  a  mistake 
to  call  upon  the  Lord  of  Hosts,  who  maketh  wars  to  cease  in  all 
the  world,  "  for  peace  and  deliverance  from  our  enemies;"  the 
application  should  be  made  to  the  Board  of  Arbitration  at  the 
Hague. 

These  men  are  like  Paddy's  steed,  which  he  offered  to  sell  to 
his  squire  as  "  a  raale  good  Protestant  horse."  "  What  do  you 
mean,  Patrick  ?  "  "  Sir,  sure  he's  never  been  down  on  his 
knees." 

Take  the  case  of  one  of  these  men  when  a  loved  wife  or  darling 
child  is  in  sickness  nigh  unto  death.  Though  we  are  meant 
to  use  means,  yet  he  leans  all  his  trust  on  a  mustard  poultice, 
and  flies  for  succour — not  to  Him  who  is  the  Great  Physician, 
but  to  Mr.  Boots  the  chemist,  for  a  bottle  of  mixture,  to  be 
shaken  before  taken  three  times  a  day,  and  which  costs  him 
eighteenpence. 

The  aim  of  the  Liberal  Theologians  now  is  to  clear  the  Prayer 
Book  of  definite  doctrine,  rather  than  to  eliminate  the  objec- 
tionable rubrics.    A  broad  comprehensiveness  is  what  they 


THE  BROAD  CHURCH 


389 


aim  at,  so  that  all  should  be  embraced  within  the  Established 
Church,  whatever  they  believe  or  disbelieve.  A  Church  such 
as  this,  built  not  on  the  living  Rock,  but  on  the  shifting  sands 
of  human  opinion,  would  not  be  worth  a  pinch  of  salt. 

In  the  Gospel  parable  it  is  the  man  that  has  been  faithful 
over  a  few  things  who  is  made  ruler  over  many  things.  In 
England  at  the  present  day,  in  the  Church,  it  is  the  faithless 
servant  who  is  exalted  to  be  a  rector,  a  canon,  or  a  dean. 

The  Liberal  Church  party  would  open  the  doors  of  their 
churches  and  escort  to  their  pulpits  the  ministers  of  dissenting 
bodies.  Tarpeia  offered  to  unfold  the  gates  of  Rome  to  the 
Sabines,  if  they  would  give  her  what  they  bore  on  their  left 
arms,  meaning  their  golden  bracelets.  They  accepted,  and  as 
they  entered  the  postern,  despising  the  traitress,  cast  on  her 
their  shields  and  crushed  her  to  death.  And  these  male  Tarpeias, 
what  do  they  expect  from  the  enemies  of  the  Church  whom 
they  would  let  in  ?  Their  goodwill,  their  golden  opinions  ? 
They  will  be  buried  under  their  contempt. 

But  it  is  not  only  that  they  would  betray  the  doctrines  of  the 
Church.  They,  or  at  all  events  some  of  them,  would  betray  its 
morals  also.  Mr.  H.  M.  Garrod,  in  The  Religion  of  all  Good  Men, 
writes  :  "  Criticism  of  Christianity  upon  the  ethical  side  has 
scarcely  begun.  I  do  not  see  how  we  can  escape  the  necessity 
of  wholly  revising  our  view  of  Christian  ethics."  Again  :  "  We 
cannot  abandon  Christian  dogma  and  keep  Christian  ethics — 
that  is  true  enough.  The  objection  of  young  men  to  Christianity 
is  not  intellectual,  but  moral."  He  says  that  "  the  world  and 
the  flesh  are  the  things  which  mankind  will  never  consent  to  do 
without.  The  instinct  of  the  average  man  is  healthy,  his  cry  is 
ever  still,  Give  us  the  world  and  the  flesh,  or  we  will  smash  every 
window  in  your  palace  of  painted  superstition."  So — not  only 
must  Christian  dogma  be  revised,  but  Christian  morals  as  well. 

Into  the  ark  of  Noah  were  taken  of  clean  beasts  by  sevens, 
male  and  female,  of  unclean  by  pairs.  But  these  reformers 
would  make  of  the  Ark  of  Christ's  Church  a  receptacle  for  the 
unclean  by  sevens,  and  for  the  clean — if  they  cared  to  enter  so 
squalid  a  menagerie — by  twos. 

There  are  two  distinct  conceptions  as  to  what  a  National 
Church  should  be.  It  is  either  a  body  in  which  exists  a  definite 
and  living  faith,  not  maybe  everywhere  in  evidence  ;  like  pitch- 
blende, it  would  contain  radium,  always  giving  out  light  but 
never  exhausting  itself,  confined  necessarily  to  the  few  as  an 


390 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


active  principle,  but  permeating  the  whole  body  more  or  less. 
The  other  conception  was  that  of  Dr.  Arnold,  and  is  that  of  the 
modern  Broad  Churchman,  a  tent  spread  over  a  quicksand  that 
engulfs  and  buries  out  of  sight  everything  that  is  real  and  solid. 

We  have  such  a  Church  in  the  Evangelische  Kirche  of  Germany, 
already  referred  to,  and  a  more  unsatisfactory  creation  of  the 
State  can  hardly  be  conceived. 

Addison  tells  ,the  story  of  an  artist  who  set  up  his  painting 
in  the  market-place,  with  a  brush,  a  pot  of  black  paint  at  its 
side,  and  a  request  that  every  passer-by  should  blot  out  what 
he  regarded  as  a  blemish.  When  he  revisited  his  canvas,  every 
portion  of  the  picture  was  hidden  under  a  dash  of  tar.  And  such 
would  be  the  treatment  accorded  to  the  Church  by  these  broad- 
minded  reformers.  Every  sectarian,  every  crank,  every  man 
who  had  a  prejudice  would  be  invited  to  daub  over  and  daub 
out  a  doctrine,  a  creed,  a  psalm,  a  collect,  a  sacrament,  a  rite, 
a  rubric — till  all  left  would  be  a  worthless  blank  of  blackness. 

At  the  battle  of  Maupertuis  (Poitiers)  the  English  archers 
drew  up  in  line  across  the  King's  highway,  each  provided  with 
a  stake,  broad  enough  to  cover  his  person,  pointed  at  the 
extremity,  which  extremity  he  rammed  into  the  ground,  thus 
forming  an  impregnable  rampart  by  means  of  which  he  was  able 
to  rout  and  ruin  the  chivalry  of  France.  Like  these  stakes  has 
been  the  shield  of  the  Faith  to  every  Christian  man,  a  sure 
protection,  unless  it  be  whittled  down  to  the  slimness  of  a 
fishing-rod. 

On  the  day  upon  which  I  corrected  these  proofs  I  walked 
from  Bayonne  to  a  village  a  few  miles  distant,  and,  entering  the 
churchyard,  saw  above  a  grave  a  stone  cross,  on  which  was 
inscribed  but  one  word,  Credo.  The  happy  soul  whose  body 
lay  beneath  that  cross,  in  living  was  sustained  and  strengthened 
by  grace,  and  in  death  was  radiant  in  hope,  through  the  virtue 
of  that  same  word  Credo. 


CHAPTER  XVII 


VIA  MEDIA 

THERE  is  now  almost  nothing  remaining  of  the  bitterness 
that  once  reigned  between  the  Evangelicals  and  the 
High  Churchmen.  Members  of  the  two  parties  have 
been  brought  into  contact  in  diocesan  Synods  and 
Church  Congresses,  and  have  come  to  understand  one  another 
better,  and  to  modify  their  opinions.  Indeed  there  has  been  a 
continuous  levelling  up  of  the  Low  Church  party,  both  in  doctrine 
and  in  practice,  and  among  the  High  Church  there  has  been  a 
deepening  of  spiritualism,  so  that  the  members  of  the  two  sections 
can  work  harmoniously  together,  are  in  point  of  fact  no  longer 
to  be  regarded  as  sections,  for  they  melt  imperceptibly  into  one 
another  like  the  colours  in  the  rainbow.  Not  only  so,  but  many 
Low  Church  parents  have  children  who  have  gone  up  higher, 
and  of  whose  sincerity  and  godliness  they  can  entertain  no  doubt. 
This  even  applies  to  the  Dissenters.  The  present  Archbishop  of 
York,  a  man  very  definite  in  the  Faith,  is  the  son  of  a  Presbyterian 
minister,  and  a  well-known,  highly  esteemed  Wesleyan  preacher 
in  the  West  of  England  has  a  son  who  is  a  Cowley  Father,  and  a 
daughter  among  the  Clewer  sisters.  Very  few  of  the  children 
of  Evangelicals  remain  on  the  same  platform  as  their  parents. 
Almost  invariably,  if  they  continue  earnest  and  devout,  they 
have  become  High  Church. 

In  my  own  neighbourhood  there  is  a  lane  about  a  quarter  of 
a  mile  long,  between  high  banks,  and  very  steep.  At  the  lower 
end,  on  ascending  it,  one  can  see  in  April  the  right-hand  bank 
one  mass  of  primroses,  dense  as  the  stars  at  night  in  a  clear  sky. 
On  the  left  bank,  not  one.  But  after  mounting  some  fifty  feet, 
sporadically  appear  a  few  primroses  on  the  left  bank.  They 
become  by  degrees  more  numerous,  till  at  length  the  banks  on 
both  sides  of  the  lane  are  starred  with  the  beautiful  flowers,  on 
each  equally  abundant.    It  has  been  so  in  the  English  Church. 

39i 


392 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


The  beauty  of  holiness — by  beauty  I  mean  the  expression  in 
worship — was  for  awhile  confined  to  the  High  Church  party,  the 
right.  But  by  degrees  it  has  extended  to  the  Low  Church  side, 
till  at  last  we  may  confidently  look  to  the  same  loveliness  and 
abundance  of  the  manifestation  of  Divine  Life  in  worship  on 
one  side  as  on  the  other. 

In  the  South  of  France  it  is  not  unusual  for  boys  to  keep 
small  green  frogs  in  glass  pickle- jars  as  barometers.  A  little 
water  occupies  the  bottom  of  the  vessel,  and  a  tiny  ladder  is 
inserted,  the  base  of  which  is  in  the  fluid  and  the  top  reaches 
nearly  to  the  mouth  of  the  jar.  In  very  wet  weather  the  frogs 
remain  submerged,  but  at  a  change  they  ascend  the  scale,  and 
the  degree  on  which  they  squat  indicates  what  the  weather 
will  be. 

On  visiting  a  large  town  in  the  North  of  England,  I  was  talking 
to  my  host  about  the  religious  condition  of  the  place.  He  said  : 
"  We  have  here  churches  of  all  kinds,  from  the  lowest  of  the  low, 
through  the  stages  of  high  and  dry,  to  very  high." 

That  is  as  it  should  be,  for  when  Dissenters  emerge  from  their 
native  element,  either  because  they  are  weary  of  pulpit  politics 
in  their  chapels,  or  because  they  have  quarrelled  with  the 
deacons,  or  because  their  spiritual  condition  demands  something 
higher  and  better,  they  at  first  find  their  way  into  the  seats 
of  the  Low  Church.  Perhaps  they  may  remain  there  all  the 
rest  of  their  lives,  perhaps  they  may  begin  to  crawl  higher ; 
but  almost  invariably  they  see  their  young  people  advance 
to  churches  above  their  own  heads. 

This  ladder  system  in  the  English  Church  is  altogether  to  be 
commended.  There  is  a  rung  for  every  kind  of  temperament 
and  spiritual  condition.  And  this  is  what  every  Bishop  in 
England  and  the  Colonies,  who  is  wise,  recognizes  and  welcomes. 

In  France  and  Germany  a  great  gulf  is  fixed  between  the 
Catholics  and  Protestants.  There  is  no  bridge  to  connect  them, 
there  are  no  ladders.  Every  year  each  community  loses  members 
that  drop  off  into  indifference  or  into  actual  hostility  to  religion. 
It  is  most  unusual  for  the  members  of  one  community  to  leap 
across  the  chasm  into  the  other.  To  the  Catholic,  Calvinism 
is  absolutely  repulsive,  and  an  Evangelical  cannot  stomach 
the  amount  of  superstition  that  goes  along  with  positive  truth 
in  the  Catholic  Church.  The  statue  on  a  column  is  sometimes 
so  surrounded  with  the  frippery  of  decoration  as  to  obscure  the 
figure  itself.    I  was  much  struck  with  the  impassable  gulf  when 


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393 


in  the  Cevennes.  At  Merueis  the  population  is  about  equally 
divided  between  Calvinists  and  Catholics.  The  temple  of  the 
former  is  octagonal.  Internally  it  has  a  pulpit  in  the  middle, 
and  the  seats  of  the  audience  are  ranged  about  it.  Not  a  decora- 
tion of  any  sort  to  relieve  the  utter  barrenness  of  the  place  of 
preaching.  Nothing  there  to  attract,  everything  to  repel.  In 
the  Catholic  parish  church  an  excess  of  the  most  trumpery 
tinsel  adornment,  the  music  at  High  Mass  execrable,  the  service 
slatternly,  the  preaching  commonplace.  Obviously  it  occurred 
to  neither  community  that  it  was  worth  while  trying  to  attract 
across  the  chasm. 

It  would  be  fatal  in  England  were  there  not  rungs  at  regular 
intervals  in  the  Church  ladder.  All  minds,  all  souls,  are  not  con- 
stituted alike.  Some  desire  a  vague  sentimentalism  in  religion  ; 
like  Ixion,  they  embrace  a  cloud  and  are  content  to  hug  a 
chilly  nebulosity ;  others  abhor  indefiniteness.  I  saw  in  the 
newspaper  the  other  day  that  a  man  on  the  Thames  Embank- 
ment had  died  of  the  London  fog.  And  souls  perish  who  are 
given  only  a  vague  and  vaporous  Christianity,  with  soot  in 
suspension. 

It  is  well,  it  is  essential,  that  a  Church  resting  on  the  broad 
basis  of  humanity  should  have  provision  made  for  those  who 
have  little  power  of  assimilation.  This  was  realized  to  a  certain 
extent  in  the  Latin  Church  in  the  Middle  Ages,  when  in  the 
Cistercian  churches  the  decoration  was  reduced  to  a  minimum — 
when  even  singing  was  forbidden  in  the  Offices.  A  dull,  grim, 
and  tedious  service  was  provided  for  dull,  grim,  and  heavy  minds  ; 
that  were  able  to  lay  hold  of  the  principles  of  the  Christian  Faith, 
but  preferred  to  have  them  painted  drab. 

It  is  with  Faith  as  with  the  sight.  All  are  not  specially  clear- 
sighted. So  long  as  the  men  see,  we  must  be  content  if  they  see 
but  a  little  way,  and  be  thankful  that  we  see  more ;  and  if  some 
see  incorrectly — "  men  as  trees  walking  " — we  must  be  patient 
with  them,  and  help  them  to  see  accurately,  and  not  be  angry 
at  their  mistakes.  Heresy  is  really  the  exaltation  of  one  article 
of  faith  at  the  expense  of  other  truths.  Neither  Manicheism  nor 
Gnosticism  was  a  heresy,  it  was  a  religion  apart  from  Christianity, 
that  had  certain  shreds  and  particles  of  Christianity  adhering 
to  it.  Mormonism  is  the  same.  But  the  Protestant  sects  of 
the  present  day  in  England  owe  their  vitality  to  the  truth  of 
one  or  more  articles  of  belief  to  which  they  cling.  Where  they 
err  is  that  they  fail  to  grasp  the  complementary  verities.  Some, 


394 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


like  Pterilaus,  have  but  one  gold  hair  on  their  heads — one  Truth. 
Deprive  them  of  that  and  they  perish.  Some  sects  are  like  the 
Gorgon  sisters,  with  a  single  tooth  between  them ;  all  the  rest  are 
useless  stumps.  There  may  be  but  one  hair,  yet  that  is  gold  ;  one 
tooth,  yet  that  is  sound ;  one  Christian  verity,  but  that  is  very 
truth.    Anyhow,  one  is  better  than  none  at  all. 

When  a  tadpole  is  about  to  change  into  a  frog  it  must  have  a 
ledge  just  within  reach,  and  no  more,  above  water,  on  which  to 
effect  its  transformation.  Without  such  a  ledge  it  infallibly  dies. 
I  kept  tadpoles  in  a  pail  when  I  was  a  boy,  and  I  could  not  make 
out  at  first  how  it  was  that  in  the  morning,  after  they  had  given 
promise  of  change,  their  corpses  floated  on  the  water.  I  put  in 
a  bit  of  wood,  and  the  rest  mounted  that,  and  lived.  Before 
each  changed,  it  had  not  developed  legs  wherewith  to  leap. 
And  for  those  whose  heads  are  just  above  Nonconformity,  and 
are  inclined  to  be  transformed  into  Churchmen,  the  Churches 
which  are  in  Evangelical  hands  are  a  spiritual  necessity. 

In  most  of  our  towns  the  ladder  system  prevails,  but  there 
are  some,  and  certain  seaside  resorts,  where  it  does  not — such, 
for  instance,  as  are  pocket  boroughs  of  the  Simeonite  Trustees. 
The  spiritual  condition  of  the  residents  suffers,  for  there  are 
now  thousands  grown  to  man's  estate,  aged  and  grey-headed, 
who  have  been  brought  up  from  childhood  with  full  Catholic 
training  and  accustomed  to  Catholic  worship,  and  who  cannot 
endure  what  they  find  in  these  churches.  In  a  good  many  cases 
they  cease  to  attend  them,  and  make  journeys,  when  weather 
permits,  to  surrounding  villages  where  they  can  obtain  that 
to  which  they  have  been  accustomed. 

The  same  thing  applies  to  foreign  chaplaincies.  Such  as 
are  in  the  hands  of  the  Colonial  and  Continental  Society  have 
too  often  their  services  on  so  low  a  scale  that  those  who  at  home 
have  never  seen  anything  like  the  weird  performances  in  these 
chapels,  withdraw  after  a  single  visit,  and  either  move  to  another 
place  where  is  an  S.P.G.  chaplaincy,  or  else  attend  the  Roman 
Catholic  churches ;  not  that  it  occurs  to  them  for  a  moment  to 
quit  the  Anglican  Communion,  but  that  they  cannot  relish  her 
services  carried  out  in  a  way  to  which  they  are  not  accustomed 
and  which  to  them  is  absolutely  repellent.  There  is,  however, 
this  to  be  said  for  Colonial  and  Continental  Society  chapels, 
that  a  good  many  have  been  levelled  up,  provide  early  Celebra- 
tions every  Sunday  and  Holy  Day,  and  are  improved  on  what 
they  were,  as  I  can  remember,  fifty  years  ago.    Still,  they 


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395 


represent  the  English  service  in  its  basest  form.  They  are  a 
pis  aller,  and  nothing  more.1 

In  country  villages  there  is  no  choice  given  to  the  parishioners. 
There  is  but  the  one  parish  church  ;  and  the  incumbent,  if  he 
has  any  discretion,  recognizes  this  fact,  and  makes  a  ladder  of 
his  services,  so  that  all  spiritual  requirements  may  be  met.  It 
is  just  as  foolish  to  give  pap  to  a  healthy  man  as  it  is  to  give  salt 
beef  to  one  with  a  feeble  digestion.  I  knew  the  case  of  a  wretched 
tramp  who  for  a  frolic  allowed  some  young  men  to  ram  a  billiard 
ball  down  his  throat.  It  was  extracted  with  extreme  difficulty, 
after  the  man  had  spent  the  worst  half-hour  in  his  life.  If  it 
had  descended  into  his  stomach  he  could  not  have  digested  it. 
Certain  inconsiderate  young  clergy  think  to  ram  full  Catholic 
doctrine  down  every  throat.  They  do  not  consider  that  souls 
have  digestions  as  well  as  stomachs,  and  that  some  can  no  more 
assimilate  such  teaching,  taken  in  a  lump,  than  the  hungry  tramp 
could  have  digested  the  billiard  ball. 

It  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  English  people  for  a  long 
time  have  been  given  little  solid  food  in  the  form  of  definite 
instruction.  Every  sensible  man  knows  that  it  is  fatal  to  give 
those  who  have  been  starved  as  much  solid  food  to  consume 
as,  perhaps,  they  would  like. 

Those  at  the  summit  of  the  Church  ladder  regard  such  as  are 
planted  on  lower  perches  with  sympathy  and  goodwill,  but  it 
is  otherwise,  too  often,  with  those  at  the  bottom — they  con- 
template the  occupants  of  a  higher  rung  with  suspicion  and 
alarm  ;  for,  unlike  Jacob's  ladder,  on  which  angels  descended  as 
well  as  ascended,  there  is  no  down-current  on  this  scale  ;  indeed, 
hardly  ever  are  there  instances  of  retrogression. 

Nebulous  matter  has  condensed  into  planets,  but  no  planet 
has  ever  resolved  itself  back  into  a  nebula ;  and  it  is  scarcely 
conceivable  that  one  who  has  absorbed  and  assimilated  definite 
Catholic  teaching  can  eject  it  and  return  to  amorphous  Protes- 
tantism. 

The  ladder  system  is  in  conformity  with  nature.  All  life 
is  constituted  on  a  scale  from  the  lowest  bit  of  animated  proto- 

1  I  see  that  Mr.  Athelstan  Riley's  A  Guide  to  High  Mass  Abroad,  "  being 
a  manual  for  the  use  of  English  churchmen  attending  the  Celebration 
of  the  Holy  Eucharist  in  Roman  Catholic  countries,"  has  gone  into  a 
fifth  edition  already.  What  does  this  show  but  that  a  large  number  of 
English  people  on  the  Continent  so  dislike  the  manner  in  which  the 
Anglican  service  is  performed  in  Colonial  and  Continental  Society  chapels, 
that  they  give  them  a  wide  berth,  and  go  to  towns  better  served,  or  to 
Roman  Catholic  churches  ?    The  same  applies  to  Ireland. 


396 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


plasm  to  the  most  highly  organized  being.  The  breath  of  life, 
which  is  the  Spirit  of  God,  is  in  the  lichen  on  the  wall  as  well 
as  in  the  rose  and  the  palm  tree  ;  in  the  sea-slug  as  well  as  in 
the  gold-fish.  Why  should  there  not  be  degrees  of  spiritual 
capacity  and  apprehension  in  man  ?  And  if  there  be,  as  as- 
suredly there  are,  then  the  Church  of  England  is  right  in  pro- 
viding for  all.  Our  "  unhappy  divisions  "  are  only  the  intervals 
in  the  inevitable  ladder  of  progression. 

An  old  friend,  when  I  invited  him  to  accompany  me  for  a 
walk,  replied  :  "No,  thank  you.  Your  legs  are  long  and  mine  are 
short.  You  stride  far  ahead  of  me.  If  you  want  me  to  listen 
to  your  opinions,  gain  instruction  or  amusement  from  your  dis- 
course, you  must  accommodate  your  pace  to  mine."  Intelli- 
gences, like  bodies,  have  not  all  the  same  length  of  leg,  and  some 
lag  far  behind  others.  If  we  desire  to  convince  or  persuade  the 
short-legged  minds,  we  with  long  legs  must  limit  the  length  of 
our  stride.  When  one  of  twain  acts  as  a  guide  he  may  keep  a 
foot-length  ahead  of  the  other,  but  he  is  valueless  as  a  leader  if 
he  be  a  mile  in  advance. 

A  friend,  now  no  more — Canon  Sowden  of  Hebden  Bridge, 
Yorkshire — had  the  very  ugliest  of  the  Peel  churches  I  ever 
saw,  pewed  high  with  deal,  with  a  three-decker  obscuring  the 
little  altar  in  an  alcove  behind  it.  I  asked  him  how  he  could 
endure  to  minister  for  many  years  in  such  a  place.  He  replied, 
"  I  must  educate  the  people  till  they  can  no  longer  endure  it." 

He  did  so,  and  before  he  died  saw  risen  in  its  room  a  glorious 
fabric,  with  dignified  chancel  and  stately  altar,  such  as  for 
long  years  he  had  desired — built  by  the  people  whom  he  had 
trained  no  longer  to  tolerate  the  former  unsightly  edifice.  First 
the  blade,  then  the  ear,  afterwards  the  full  corn  in  the  ear. 
Genuine,  consistent  advance  is  made  by  steps,  not  by  jumps, 
least  of  all  with  a  leaping-pole. 

If  there  be  truth  in  the  doctrine  of  Evolution,  then  in  every 
stage  of  life  there  is  a  prophecy  and  promise  of  something  higher. 
The  serpent  has  undeveloped  limbs  beneath  its  skin,  but  they 
come  into  existence  as  members  in  the  lizard.  In  this  upward 
march  there  are  starts  and  expansions  that  are  unfulfilled  in  the 
higher- developed  creatures.  We,  with  our  pithy  teeth,  have 
to  submit  them  periodically  to  the  dentist ;  but  the  snail  has 
them  so  hard  that,  like  diamonds,  they  will  scratch  glass.  We 
have  our  lungs  folded  up  behind  our  ribs,  and  we  protect  them 
with  flannel  and  occasionally  have  to  nurse  them  with  a  mustard 


VIA  MEDIA 


397 


poultice.  But  in  the  butterfly  the  lungs  are  drawn  forth  at  the 
sides,  unfurled  and  feathered  with  every  tint  of  the  rainbow. 
Is  this  a  prophecy  of  what  may  be  with  us  in  a  higher  reach  of 
creation  ?  We  cannot  say ;  but  we  do  know  that  this  teaches 
us  not  to  regard  ourselves  as  the  crown  and  ne  plus  ultra  of  nature. 
And  so  in  religion. 

There  are  generally,  in  phases  of  religion  below  the  highest, 
among  the  Evangelicals,  even  in  the  various  forms  of  Dissent, 
important  truths  that  have  been  too  long  neglected  in  the  Church. 
There  is  a  truth  in  Congregationalism,  that  the  people  should  have 
something  to  say  as  to  the  appointment  of  their  pastors.  At 
one  time,  the  bishops,  even  the  Popes,  were  elected  by  people 
and  clergy.  That  we  have  lost.  There  is  a  truth  in  Calvinism, 
there  is  such  a  thing  as  predestination.  Are  not  we  who 
have  our  Christian  and  Church  privileges  predestined  to  know 
and  serve  God  in  a  way  denied  to  the  Mussulman  and  the 
heathen  ?  Is  there  not  a  truth  in  Mohammedanism  itself — the 
conviction  that  there  is  but  One  God,  and  that  He  must  be 
worshipped  ?  And  have  not  our  Christians  forgotten  this,  who 
neglect  their  private  prayers,  desert  public  worship  that  they 
may  boat  on  the  Thames  or  motor  about  the  roads  on  the  Lord's 
own  day  ?  There  is  a  truth  in  the  Wesleyan — the  truth  of 
necessity  for  many  souls  to  be  converted,  and  brought  to  realize 
the  importance  of  religion,  and  of  a  change  of  life  from  one  of 
worldliness  to  that  of  love  of,  and  obedience  to  God.  There  is  a 
truth  in  Mrs.  Eddie's  faith-healing,  that  prayer  avails  mightily, 
and  above  the  administration  of  drugs.  We  must  look  down 
on  these  manifestations  of  religious  conviction,  and  learn  from 
them. 

Of  course  liberty  of  worship  and  of  prophecy  have  to  be 
restrained  within  due  bounds,  otherwise  the  door  is  opened  to 
confusion  and  anarchy.  And  then,  again,  we  have  to  remember 
that  individual  tastes  must  be  subordinated  to  general  edification 
and  corporate  worship.  Bacon  says  in  one  of  his  Essays :  "It 
is  noted  by  one  of  the  Fathers,  Christ's  coat  indeed  had  no  seam, 
but  the  Church's  vesture  was  of  divers  colours  ;  whereupon  he 
saith  In  veste  varietas  sit,  scissura  non  sit ;  they  be  two  things, 
unity  and  uniformity." 

Bishop  Wilberforce  wrote  in  1866  :  "  There  may  be  differences 
of  opinion  as  to  the  extent  to  which  Ritualistic  observances 
should  prevail  in  public  worship.  The  conformation  of  men's 
minds  differs.    The  conformation  of  my  mind  leads  me  to  be 


398 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


satisfied  with  the  simplest  form  as  being  the  most  productive  of 
devotion  ;  but  it  is  not  so  with  others,  and  I  have  no  right  to 
make  what  suits  me  the  law  for  everybody  else."  In  his  charge 
of  1866  he  advocated  "  the  revival  of  old  English,  not  the 
aping  of  Roman  ways."  A  development,  a  growth  after  long 
sleep  of  what  had  been,  not  an  importation  from  abroad  of  what 
had  never  been. 

Some  of  the  early  Tractarians  took  umbrage  at  the  attitude 
of  Hooker  and  other  Anglican  divines  because  they  refused  to 
unchurch  the  Zwinglian,  Calvinist,  and  Lutheran  Communities 
which  had — so  they  considered — ruptured  the  spinal  cord  of 
Church  continuity.  But  these  divines  drew  a  distinction  be- 
tween wilful  schism  and  schism  compelled  by  necessity.  There 
is  a  man  now  working  on  the  roads  near  my  home  who  some  years 
ago  fell  down  a  mine-shaft  and  dislocated  his  shoulder.  This 
was  not  at  first  found  out,  and  when  finally  it  was  discovered, 
the  socket  had  been  filled  by  osseous  formation ;  but  a  false 
socket  had  been  formed,  so  that  the  man  can  use  his  arm  and 
earn  his  bread  with  it,  though  he  cannot  raise  it  high.  Now 
what  has  happened  to  the  Communities  in  the  Protestant  world 
is,  that  they  do  a  good  work,  and  proclaim  certain  Christian 
truths,  are  zealous  and  devout ;  but  this  is  the  case  only  because 
a  false  socket  has  been  formed.  As  in  nature,  so  in  spiritual 
matters,  there  are  recuperative  powers,  makeshifts,  and  side- 
adjustments. 

Since  Dr.  Newman  veered  about,  and  in  Via  Media  of  the 
Anglican  Church  (1877)  laboured  to  confute  the  theory  which  he 
had  himself  broached  in  earlier  years,  and  pronounced  it  an 
unworkable  theory,  it  has  fallen  somewhat  into  disrepute.  And 
it  is  not  a  tenable  theory,  if  it  be  held  that  the  English  Church 
was  deliberately  reformed  on  the  principle  of  standing  between 
two  antagonists,  and  trying  to  keep  the  peace  between  them, 
without  compromising  herself  with  either.  What  she  did 
attempt  under  Elizabeth  was  to  allow  a  corner  within  her  house 
for  those  infected  with  foreign  heresies,  in  hopes  of  reclaiming 
them,  just  as  in  a  family  one  or  two  members,  showing  signs  of 
aberration  of  intellect,  are  allowed  to  remain.  There  is  a  shrinking 
from  turning  them  out  of  doors,  or  sending  them  to  an  asylum, 
unless  they  become  raving  maniacs.  It  was  possibly  a  mistaken 
policy,  but  it  was  a  policy  conceived  in  charity. 

Newman's  view  of  the  via  media,  which  he  condemned  as  an 
impracticable  system,  was  that  the  English  Reformers  tried  to 


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399 


occupy  a  middle  position  between  the  Church  of  Rome  and  the 
Continental  Reformers.  But  I  do  not  think  this  view  is  tenable. 
They  were  engrossed  in  purifying  the  English  Church  as  best 
they  might  according  to  their  lights,  without  any  definite  purpose 
of  taking  a  via  media  position. 

It  is  a  conceivable  theory  that  Cranmer  and  his  associates 
were  inclined  to  entirely  decatholicize  the  English  Church,  but 
that  they  were  afraid  of  outraging  the  people  by  revolutionary 
treatment  of  the  Prayer  Book.  In  Sweden  Gustavus  Vasa  com- 
pletely protestantized  the  Church  in  his  dominions,  but  he  allowed 
the  shell  to  remain  almost  intact,  archbishops,  bishops,  altars, 
crucifixes,  lights,  vestments,  wafer  bread.  In  Denmark  and 
Norway  it  was  the  same.  The  kernel  was  extracted,  and  the 
husk  allowed  to  remain,  so  as  to  deceive  the  people. 

The  Nile  after  a  while  splits  into  branches :  one  diverges  to 
the  right,  and  is  swallowed  up  in  unfathomable  morasses ;  another 
takes  its  course  to  the  left,  is  strong  and  voluminous,  and  it 
sweeps  along  with  it  the  sad,  but  it  does  not  represent  the  whole 
river,  and  between  the  two  flows  a  current  steadily  to  the  sea, 
and  that  is  the  midway  of  the  river.  The  idea  of  a  via  media 
did  not  enter  the  heads  of  the  Reformers.  All  that  they  desired 
to  do  was  to  clear  their  own  branch  of  the  stream  of  the  mass 
of  weeds  that  obstructed  its  course  and  provoked  divergencies. 
If  as  a  result  of  their  labours  the  Church  of  England  found  herself, 
or  was  found  by  others,  to  occupy  an  intermediate  position, 
that  had  not  been  consciously  aimed  at,  it  was  rather  accidental 
than  otherwise. 

Actually  and  unequivocally  the  Anglican  Church  is  far  nearer 
to  the  Church  of  Rome  than  to  the  Lutheran  and  Evangelical 
sects  abroad.  She  has  retained  her  Apostolic  Succession  and 
Episcopal  rule.  In  the  Early  Church  and  in  the  Oriental  Church 
to  this  day  the  Constitution  is  and  was  one  of  a  federation  of 
bishops.  In  Latin  Christianity  this  federation  has  been  sub- 
verted, and  changed  into  a  domination  by  one  man.  We  re- 
verted to  primitive  usage.  Our  liturgical  Offices  are  closely  allied 
to  the  Mass  and  the  Breviary  services,  and  bear  no  resemblance 
whatever  to  those  of  Calvinists,  Zwinglians,  and  the  Prussian 
Evangelical  Establishment. 

It  may  not  be  amiss  to  compare  them.  I  will  take  (i)  the 
Sarum  Missal,  (2)  the  Prayer  Book  of  1662,  (3)  the  Puritan 
Directory  of  1644,  (4)  the  Communion  Service  of  the  Evan- 
gelische  Kirche,  from  the  Wiirtemberg  book  of  1908.    I  will 


400 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


show  how  that  in  our  Liturgy  there  has  been  little  other  than 
displacement  of  parts. 


Sarum  Missal. 


I.  Preparation  of 
the  Priest. 

II.  Confession  and 
Absolution. 

III.  Kyrie,  9  times. 

IV.  Gloria  in  Ex- 
celsis. 

V.  Collects,  Epistle, 
and  Gospel. 

VI.  Nicene  Creed. 


VII.  Oblation  at  the 
altar  of  Bread 
and  Wine. 

VIII.  Secreta  for 
acceptance  of  Ob- 
lation. 


IX.  Sursum  Corda. 


X.  Preface. 


XI.  Sanctus. 

XII.  Commemora- 
tion of  Living. 

XIII.  Consecration 
Prayer  with  the 
manual  acts. 

XIV.  Commemora- 
tion of  Departed. 

XV.  Prayer  of 
Humble  Access 
(for  Priest  alone) . 

XVI.  Communion 
of  Priest. 

XVII.  Communion 
of  people,  kneel- 
ing. 

XVIII.  Post-Com- 
munion Prayers. 

XIX.  Blessing  and 
Dismissal. 


Prayer  Book  of  1662. 


Preparation  of  the 
Priest  (S.M.  I.). 

Commandmen  t  s 
and  Kyrie,  10 
times  (S.M.  III.). 

Gloria  transferred 

{S.M.  IV.). 
Collects,  Epistle, 

and  Gospel  {S.M. 

V.  ). 

Nicene  Creed  (S.M. 

VI.  ). 

Oblation  at  the 
altar  of  Bread 
and  Wine  (S.M. 

VII.  ). 
Church  Militant 

prayer  of  Obla- 
tion, and  Com- 
memoration of 
the  Living  and 
Dead(S.M.VIIL, 
XII..  XIV.). 

Confession  and  Ab- 
solution  (S.M. 
II.). 

Sursum  Corda 

(S.M.  IX.). 

Preface  (S.M.  X.). 

Sanctus  (S.M.  XL). 

Prayer  of  Humble 
Access  (S.M. 
XV.). 

Consecration  Prayer 
(S.M.  XIII.)  with 
the  manual  acts. 


Communion  of 
Priest  (S.M. 
XVI.). 

Communion  of 
people,  kneeling 
(S.M.  XVII.). 

Post-  Communion 
Prayers  (S.M. 
XVIIL). 

Blessing  and  Dis- 
missal (S.M. 
XIX.). 


Puritan  Directory  of 
1644. 


1.  Exhortation  and 
Invitation. 

2.  Seating  Commu- 
nicants round  the 
Table. 

3.  Reading  of  the 
words  of  Institu- 
tion as  a  lesson, 
and  not  as  a 
prayer. 

4.  Extempore 

Prayer. 


5.  Joint  Commun- 
ion of  minister 
and  people,  all 
seated.  No  pre- 
scribed words  of 
Administration. 


6.  Exhortation 
after  Communion. 


7.  Thanksgiving. 


Evangelische  Kirchen 
Buch,  three  forms. 


I 

1.  Exhortation  and 
Invitation. 

2.  Prayer  with 
reading  the  words 
of  Institution  (no 
manual  acts). 

3.  Communion  of 
pastors  andpeople 
standing. 

4.  Thanksgiving. 

5.  Blessing  and  Dis- 
missal. 


II 

1.  Exhortation. 

2.  Words  of  In- 
stitution read  as 
a  Lesson. 

3.  Communion, 

standing. 

4.  Thanksgiving. 


Ill 

1.  Exhortation. 

2.  Prayer. 

3.  Recitation  of 
Institution  (no 
manual  acts). 

4.  Communion, 

standing. 

5.  Thanksgiving. 

6.  Blessing  and  Dis- 
missal. 


Every  Liturgiologist  knows  what  dislocation  and  unintelligent 
patching  together  have  taken  place  in  the  Roman  Mass.    As  it 


VIA  MEDIA 


401 


happens,  there  are  thirty-one  items  common,  literally  or  sub- 
stantially, to  the  Ordinary  and  Canon  of  the  Sarum  Missal  and 
the  Communion  Service  of  1662.  The  only  one  direct  point  of 
contact  between  these  two  rites  and  the  Middleburgh  Puritan 
Prayer  Book  of  1586,  the  Directory  of  1644,  or  the  Scottish 
Presbyterian  Liturgy  of  the  same  date,  is  the  recitation  of  the 
words  of  institution  ;  which,  however,  are  entirely  detached 
from  any  prayer  said  over  the  bread  and  wine. 

Dr.  Lushington  cannot  have  known  much  when  he  said  of  the 
English  Prayer  Book  :  "  The  Mass  is  gone,  root  and  branch.' ' 

The  term  via  media  has  for  some  time  been  restricted  to  a  body 
of  men  in  the  English  Church  who  occupy  the  middle  rungs  of  the 
ladder  of  opinion  and  practice  ;  men  who  stand  aloof  equally 
from  a  Romanizing  party,  and  from  that,  the  breath  of  which 
smells  of  Geneva.  These  men  wisely  deprecate  violent  changes. 
They  consider,  and  justly,  the  effect  produced  on  the  national 
mind  and  temperament  by  the  convulsions  of  the  past,  the  degra- 
dation caused  by  the  Latitudinarians,  the  deadness,  the  spiritual 
numbness  of  the  Georgian  period,  the  lop-sided  presentation  of 
the  Faith  by  the  Evangelicals — and  all  this  has  to  be  overcome. 
Little  by  little,  line  upon  line,  precept  upon  precept,  must  be 
the  rule.  This  is  perfectly  true  ;  but  it  should  never  content  a 
moderate  man  to  stand  still.  A  middle  way  must  not  become 
immobility.  There  must  be  movement  and  advance,  the  pace 
of  progress  regulated  by  circumstances  and  well  considered.  No 
man  should  complacently  practise  the  Goose-step  all  his  life 
long,  and  natter  himself  that  he  is  making  way. 

The  temptation  exists  quieta  non  movere,  so  as  to  save  trouble 
and  inconvenience,  and  this  is  precisely  the  temptation  that 
besets  the  via-media  man,  and  too  often  masters  him. 

A  man  inclined  to  the  via  media  should  well  consider,  in  a  place 
where  the  bulk  of  the  population  consists  of  artisans  and  labourers, 
that  these  are  men  who  are  impatient  of  the  via  media. 

In  one  of  iEsop's  fables  is  the  story  of  a  traveller  who  came  for 
shelter  to  a  satyr's  cave,  numbed  by  frost,  and  he  blew  on  his 
fingers.  The  satyr  asks  his  reason  for  so  doing.  He  replies  : 
"  To  warm  my  chilled  members."  Presently  the  host  produces 
a  bowl  of  hot  porridge.  The  traveller  blows  on  that.  11  Why 
so  ?  "  "To  cool  the  porridge."  "  I  will  not  harbour  under 
my  roof  one  who  blows  hot  and  cold  with  the  same  breath,"  said 
the  satyr,  and  kicked  him  out. 

But  the  traveller  was  right  and  the  satyr  was  wrong.  The 
26 


402 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


circumstances  differed,  and  that  the  satyr  could  not  understand. 
The  satyr  represents  the  vast  majority  of  our  population,  which 
likes  a  man  to  be  thorough. 

The  Rev.  Conrad  Noel,  in  his  essay  on  "  Organized  Labour  " 
in  Facing  the  Facts  (1911),  says  of  the  working  men :  "  It  is  im- 
portant to  notice  with  some  accuracy  the  kind  of  church  they 
do  not  go  to.  Anglicanism  in  the  mind  of  the  general  public, 
the  Anglicanism  to  whose  services  the  working  man  does  not  go, 
is  represented  by  monotoned  matins  and  evensong,  the  surpliced 
choir,  hymns  Ancient  and  Modern,  and  a  sermon  on  domestic 
morality  and  the  joys  of  the  world  to  come."  This  is  true  whether 
of  the  town  or  the  country. 

That  surpliced  choir,  so  dear  to  the  Anglican  heart,  is  like  two 
ridges  of  snow  in  the  chancel,  freezing  the  voices  and  devotion 
of  the  congregation  in  the  nave. 

Go  into  a  German  Roman  Catholic  church  for  the  Volksmesse, 
and  you  will  find  it  crammed  to  the  door,  and  the  whole  congre- 
gation, mostly  made  up  of  men,  singing  the  vernacular  hymns — 
accompanied  by  the  organ,  but  with  no  surpliced  choir.  Go 
into  a  Calvinist  church  in  Holland,  or  an  Evangelical  church  in 
Germany,  and  you  will  hear  in  the  same  manner  the  whole 
congregation  singing — and  no  surpliced  choir.  If  we  want  to  get 
the  men  to  church,  and  the  working  men  above  all,  we  must  give 
them  services  in  which  they  will  take  the  principal  part  as  far 
as  the  music  goes  :  no  anthems,  no  "  Services  "  for  Magnificat 
and  Nunc  dimittis,  but  plain  and  popular  chants,1  and  for  a 
hymnal  something  robust  and  free  from  mawkish  sentiment. 

In  the  German  Volksmesse  the  priest  is  either  inaudible  in  a 
cathedral  or  but  faintly  heard.  It  is  the  people's  and  not  the 
priest's  mass,  and  they  crowd  to  it.  But  very  few  attend  the 
High  Mass,  at  which  elaborate  music  is  performed  by  orchestra 
and  choir. 

Stand  outside  any  little  wayside  dissenting  chapel,  and  listen 
to  the  singing.  There  is  no  organ,  no  choir — the  congregation 
are  choir  and  organ  in  one,  and  for  heartiness  they  shame  the 
service  in  the  parish  church.  I  felt  this  very  strongly  when 
Sankey  and  Moody  came  over  to  England,  with  their  hymns  set 
to  popular  music  full  of  melody.  The  hymns  went  everywhere, 
were  sung  everywhere,  were  whistled  by  the  ploughboy  behind 
his  team,  and  hummed  by  the  seamstress  over  her  sewing  machine. 

1  Where  a  church  has  a  surpliced  choir,  that  choir  might  sing  alternate 
verses  with  the  congregation. 


VIA  MEDIA 


403 


I  compiled  a  little  collection  of  Church  Songs  which  is  published 
by  the  S.P.C.K.  to  give  to  Church  people,  some  hymns 
with  definite  teaching  and  with  choruses,  and  set  to  melodious 
airs.  It  did  not  take.  The  clergy  were  too  apathetic,  too 
wedded  to  the  routine  of  the  approved  hymnals  to  venture  on 
so  bold  an  innovation.  For  twenty-eight  years  I  have  in  my 
little  parish  of  about  200  people  used  these  Church  Songs  along 
with  Ancient  and  Modern,  and  it  would  be  worth  hearing 
how  the  congregation  shout  in  them.  We  must  study  the 
cravings  of  the  people — adapt  our  services  to  them. 

The  position  of  the  Anglican  Book  of  Common  Prayer  as  a 
lay  manual  of  devotion  is  unprecedented  and  unparalleled.  The 
authorized  public  formularies  of  other  Churches  are  intended  for 
the  clergy  alone.  In  vain  in  Ulm,  a  town  of  52,000  inhabitants, 
nearly  all  Protestant,  did  I  seek  in  the  five  booksellers'  shops  for 
the  authorized  Gebetbuch.1  In  the  three  greatest  ancient 
Christian  communities — Latin,  Greek,  and  Russian — the  service- 
books  are  not  even  in  the  vernacular  tongue,  nor  are  they  ob- 
tainable at  a  cheap  rate.  Roman  Catholic  laics  can  indeed  have 
their  "  Missal  for  the  Laity,"  "  Paroissien,"  etc.,  but  these  do 
not  profess  to  contain  the  whole  service  which  the  priest  is 
reciting,  and  provide  private  devotions  which  the  worshippers 
may  employ  simultaneously  with  the  orisons  of  the  Church. 
But  the  English  Prayer  Book  was  designed  to  serve  both  priest 
and  laics  alike,  and  to  weld  the  devotions  of  one  with  those  of 
the  other.  It  has  not  been  as  successful  as  was  desired,  and  to 
the  uneducated  and  untrained  in  its  use  it  is  a  bewildering  book. 
What  we  must  strive  to  do  is  to  popularize  it  by  a  simplifying 
process  in  mission  chapels. 

At  the  present  day,  I  suppose  that  the  majority  of  the  English 
clergy  belong  to  the  via  media,  and  in  towns  where  satyrs  do  not 
dwell — that  is  to  say,  in  those  portions  of  the  towns  where  the 
respectable  class  lives,  there  they  are  in  the  right  place ;  but 
they  are  quite  out  of  their  element  in  the  slums  and  back  lanes  of 
the  city  and  in  agricultural  villages  not  dominated  by  the  squire. 

It  is  one  thing  for  an  incumbent  to  refrain  from  too  decided 
teaching  or  practice  till  his  congregation  are  in  a  condition 
to  assimilate  and  understand,  and  another  thing  altogether  to 
take  the  middle  road  because  he  is  timorous  or  lethargic. 

Unfortunately  too  many  take  the  middle  road  merely  because 

1  When  I  did  get  a  copy  at  last,  from  Stuttgart,  it  cost  10s. — the  cheapest 
edition,  I  believe  the  only  one. 


404 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


it  is  safest  and  most  convenient,  and  not  out  of  principle.  It 
is  from  this  class  that  so  many  of  our  dignitaries  are  chosen, 
and  for  whom  patrons  of  livings  are  on  the  look-out.  "  Is  he 
a  safe  man  ?  "  is  the  question  which  public  opinion  invariably 
asks  when  the  name  of  a  candidate  for  a  vacant  ecclesiastical 
office  comes  before  the  world.  Is  he  a  man  who  blows  both  hot 
and  cold  ?  No — not  blows,  only  breathes  warm  and  cool.  These 
moderate  men  naturally  seek  for  like-minded  colleagues,  hence 
the  condition  added  to  advertisements  for  curates :  "  No  extremist 
— moderate  views,"  "  No  party  man."  In  every  case  one  may 
be  pretty  sure  the  advertiser  is  a  mediocrity,  and  he  is  on  the 
search  for  one  more  mediocre  than  himself.  It  is  not  learning 
and  piety,  or  zeal,  that  is  required,  but  colourlessness,  indefinite- 
ness,  something  about  as  relishable  as  a  moderately  fresh  egg. 

So  we  get  indefinite  teaching,  lukewarm  ministrations,  and 
feeble  examples  set  before  us.  Where  there  is  energy  it  is  spent 
in  organization,  a  complex  set  of  machinery  is  set  up,  and  clergy 
and  devout  women  are  on  the  run  all  day  winding  up  these 
various  mechanisms,  and  spiritually  the  results  are  nil. 

If  the  Church  is  ever  to  regain  the  place  it  once  held  in  this 
country,  we  may  rest  assured  that  it  will  be  by  means  of  definite 
teaching  and  firm  discipline.  King  Demos,  who  rules  now, 
cannot  understand  well-balanced  expositions  of  truth,  kid-glove 
handling  of  topics  of  vital  importance,  and  he  looks  on  with 
amused  contempt  at  the  prelate  or  the  parson  trying  to  seat 
and  balance  himself  between  two  stools.  But,  as  already  said, 
the  via  media  finds  favour  with  the  upper  ten  and  with  the 
prosperous  tradesmen,  because  it  makes  no  great  demands  on 
their  faith,  their  devotion,  their  time,  and  their  pockets  ;  but 
it  will  not  win  acceptance  with  the  sons  of  toil,  or  gain  the  hearts 
of  the  young.  It  is  worth  remembering  that  Mr.  (now  Sir)  Charles 
Booth,  in  his  work  on  the  conditions  of  social  life  in  the  East 
End  of  London,  says  that  the  two  religious  bodies  which  have 
the  strongest  hold  on  the  working  population  of  that  district 
are  the  Baptists  and  the  Roman  Catholics — just  the  two  which 
are  most  dogmatic  in  their  teaching  and  strict  in  their  discipline  ; 
and  that  undenominationalism  is  utterly  sterile  in  mission  work. 

Monsignor  Benson,  in  his  Confessions  of  a  Convert,  tells  us  what 
the  motive  was  which  led  him  to  take  Holy  Orders.  "  I  decided," 
says  he,  "to  become  a  clergyman.  I  think  the  death  of  one 
of  my  sisters  about  this  time  helped  me  to  the  decision.  But, 
for  the  rest,  I  suspect  that  my  motives  rose  largely  from  the 


VIA  MEDIA 


405 


fact  that  a  clerical  life  seemed  to  offer  the  line  of  least  resistance. 
I  am  sure  that  I  was  not  calculating  enough  to  argue  to  myself 
that  being  my  father's  son  would  bring  me  emolument  or 
promotion,  for,  honestly,  these  were  no  temptation  to  me  at  all; 
but  I  think  that  on  the  natural  side,  at  any  rate,  a  life  spent  in 
an  ecclesiastical  household,  and  the  absence  of  any  other  par- 
ticular interest,  seemed  to  indicate  the  following  of  my  father's 
profession  as,  on  the  whole,  the  simplest  solution  of  the  problem 
of  my  future  "  (p.  28).  Now,  I  fancy  that  the  above  fairly 
represents  the  motives  at  work  in  inducing  a  great  number  of 
men  to  embrace  the  clerical  profession,  and  such  invariably  settle 
into  Moderate  Churchmen,  as  they  have  no  enthusiasm  and  hate 
disturbance  of  repose. 

These  are  men  who  will  not  only  not  set  the  Thames  on  fire, 
but  will  not  kindle  a  spark  of  divine  flame  in  any  human  soul ; 
they  will,  however,  keep  whatever  religion  they  find  in  their 
parishes  slowly  smouldering,  without  emitting  one  jet  of  fervent 
piety. 

Far  higher  and  nobler  motives,  thank  God,  impel  many  to 
enter  the  ministry,  and  such  will  prove  a  force  in  the  Church, 
but  such  men  will  be  shunned  or  coldly  regarded  by  their  bishops, 
and  passed  over. 

The  average  candidate  is,  I  take  it,  on  the  look-out  for  a  quiet, 
lazy  life.  Such  men,  when  ordained,  drift  about  to  divers 
curacies,  adapting  their  teaching  to  that  of  the  incumbents, 
making  themselves  popular  by  proficiency  in  lawn-tennis  or 
athletic  sports ;  or  else  they  settle  down  with  the  placens  uxor 
in  quiet  country  parsonages,  their  highest  ambition  gratified  by 
appointments  as  rural  deans  or  election  as  chairmen  of  Boards 
of  Guardians. 

Quite  apart  from  the  influence  which  the  via-media  man 
exercises  in  social  life,  and  the  various  ways  in  which  he  pro- 
motes the  welfare  of  the  nation,  there  is  one  good  end  which 
he  serves  in  the  Church,  and  that  is,  he  acts  as  ballast,  pre- 
venting dangerous  lists  to  port  or  starboard.  The  represen- 
tatives of  the  class  help  to  steady  both  maximizers  and 
minimizers.  Their  lives  are  not  thrown  away.  The  good  they 
do  in  their  parishes  is  incalculable,  but  it  is  moral  and  material; 
in  a  far  less  degree  is  it  spiritual.  The  stomachs  rather  than 
the  souls  of  their  parishioners  are  their  main  solicitude. 

There  is  another  end,  and  that  valuable,  which  the  existence 
of  this  body  serves,  and  that  is,  it  keeps  alive  what  is  a  peculiar 


406 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


characteristic  of  the  Church  of  England — its  quiet,  unobtrusive 
phase,  its  exhibition  in  nearly  every  parish  of  beautiful  family 
life,  with  the  fear  of  God  ever  before  it,  impressed  with  a  sense 
of  duty  pervading  all  its  members,  full  of  kindliness  and  generosity 
and  sympathy.  Their  example,  if  not  their  teaching,  has  a  high 
moral  efficacy.  It  is  from  the  country  parsonages  that  come 
most  of  our  best  and  most  upright  youths  who  serve  in  the  Army, 
in  the  Navy,  or  are  found  in  the  Colonies  ;  and  the  daughters  are 
the  finest  type  of  English  girl  that  can  be  produced,  not  given 
over  to  vanities  and  frivolities,  but  quiet,  sweet,  and  modest, 
and  withal  intelligent,  often  well-read,  and  always  ladylike. 

Moreover,  the  moderate  men  do  keep  alive,  in  a  state  maybe 
of  not  very  vigorous  and  efficient  life,  the  traditions  of  former 
generations ;  and  their  teaching,  though  not  very  definite,  is  ortho- 
dox. As  students  moreover,  as  many  of  them  are,  they  do  good 
service  by  their  writings  ;  unable  from  natural  temperament 
and  constitutional  timidity  to  throw  themselves  into  the  heat  of 
the  conflict,  they  supply  the  ammunition  which  keener  partisans 
are  able  to  use  with  advantage. 

The  moderate  man  has  a  great  fear  of  enthusiasm.  Pas 
trop  de  zele  is  his  motto,  and  he  possesses  what  is  a  valuable 
property  of  being  able  to  look  on  everything  from  both  sides. 
He  can  see  good  here,  but  there  is  an  objection  to  it  present  in 
his  mind.  He  is  a  qualifier  of  every  doctrine  and  practice.  Im- 
petuous men  rush  headlong  away  with  an  idea  without  waiting 
to  see  whether  it  has  its  limitations  or  its  drawbacks.  But  it 
is  precisely  the  men  of  one  idea  who  carry  all  before  them. 

Men  of  one  idea  are  occasionally  dangerous  to  the  Church,  and 
we  may  be  thankful  that  we  have  a  balance-wheel  in  the  moderate 
party  to  keep  them  from  running  the  machine  down.  But  the 
via  media  party  must  be  careful  not  to  mistrust  enthusiasm  too 
wholly.  The  prophet  rebuked  the  Israelites  for  halting  between 
two  opinions.  These  latter  considered  that  there  was  a  good 
deal  to  be  said  for  Baal,  and  perhaps,  on  the  whole,  more  for 
Jehovah,  so  they  maintained  a  via-media  position.  It  was 
much  the  same  with  the  Philadelphians,  who  were  neither  hot 
nor  cold,  only  lukewarm. 

In  the  service  of  the  State  it  is  the  mediocrities  who  are  given 
places  of  importance,  because  they  are  safe  men.  And  it  is 
doubly  so  in  the  Church.  The  really  able  man  is  set  aside, 
because  he  is  able,  and  has  ideas  of  his  own  j  and  what  is  needed 
is  the  man  who  will  trudge  along  the  beaten  path  and  never 


VIA  MEDIA 


407 


lift  his  head  to  look  over  the  wall,  or  raise  his  muzzle  to  snuff 
the  air.  Whether  it  be  a  premier  on  the  look-out  for  one  to  fill 
an  Episcopal  throne,  or  a  bishop  seeking  a  man  to  put  into 
a  living  of  importance,  he  looks  out  for  a  mediocrity.  He  knows 
that  he  can  trust  him,  a  man  who  will  cause  no  trouble,  one 
whose  paramount  conviction  is  to  retain  things  as  they  are. 
But  such  men  as  these  the  British  working  man  despises. 

A  dealer  brought  a  horse  to  a  would-be  purchaser.  "  You 
will  guarantee  that  he  does  not  run  away  ?  "  "  Sir,  he  will 
stand  stock-still  in  the  shafts.  You  must  push  him  to  make  him 
go."  "  And  he  does  not  kick  ?  "  "  Kick,  sir  !  He  is  so  stiff 
in  the  back  he  cannot  raise  his  hindquarters."  "  And  he  does 
not  shy  ?  "  "  He  is  stone-blind."  "  And  he  is  safe  ?  "  "  Safe  ! 
Absolutely.  Why,  he's  a  wooden  horse."  "  That  is  the  beast 
for  me  and  my  silver-mounted  harness.  Take  him  round  to 
the  stables  and  give  him  the  best  stall." 


INDEX 


Aberdeen  (Lord),  179 

Abyssinian  Orders,  330 

Acts  of  Uniformity,  4,  9,  10,  30,  34 

Addison  (Joseph),  390 

Address  of  Clergy,  67 

 Laity,  67 

Aguire  (Cardinal),  328 
Alasco  (John),  2,  5 
Albigenses,  329 
Alfonso  Liguori,  331 
Alms-bags,  216,  217 
Altars,  destroyed,  22 

—  replaced,  37 

Altkatholic  Congress,  209,  285 
Amy  (Sister),  226-8 
Ancient  and  Modern,  Hymns,  366, 
404 

Andrewes  (Bp.  L.),  55 
Anne  (Queen),  63,  74 
Anne's  Bounty  (Queen),  119 
Antiochus  Epiphanes,  76 
Antonio  de  Guarras,  4 
Apostolic  Succession,  14,  29,  55,  66, 
398,  399 

Arnold  (Dr.  T.),  158,  211,  384,  385, 
390 

Articles  of  Religion,  9,  162 
Ash  Wednesday,  38 
Assurance,  Doctrine  of,  82,  83,  86 
Atonement,  the,  83,  375 
Atterbury  (Bp.  F.),  63 
Austen  (Jane),  120 
Australian  Church,  89,  90,  201 

Bancroft  (Archbp.  R.),  14,  55 
Baring  (Bp.  C),  138,  180-2,  254 

—  family,  95 

—  Gould  (Rev.  C),  72 
Barlow  (Bp.),  126 

Barnabas  (S.),  Pimlico,  229-31,  239 
Barneveldt  (J.  van  O.),  79 
Barry  (Sir  E.),  166 
Bartholomew  (Black),  30,  32 

—  (Rev.  C),  345 
Baxter  (R.),  33 
Bazin  (Rene),  349,  350 
Beaconsfield  (Lord).    See  Disraeli 
Beadles,  145,  146 


Becket  (Rev.  F.),  276,  285,  287 

—  Thomas  a  (Archbp.),  114 
Beeby  (Rev.  C.  S.),  187 
Belford  Regis,  69,  129 
Bell-Cox  (Rev.  J.),  195,  251-3 
Bennett  (Rev.  W.  J.  E.),  230,  231, 

237 

Benson  (Archbp.  E.  W.),  86,  256 

—  (Monseignor),  404 

—  (Rev.  R.  M.),  356 
Berridge  (Bp.),  93 
Bethoron,  Battle  of,  370 
Beza  (Th.),  8,  14 
Bickersteth  (Bp.  E.  H.),  138,  210 

—  (Bp.  Robert),  192,  193,  204,  205 
Bilder  aus  London,  145-7 

Bill  of  Costs,  224,  239,  240,  253 

 1689,  40,  41 

Bishoprics,  impoverished,  126,  127 
Bishops,  Elizabethan,  12,  13 

—  lack  of  judgment  in,  68,  166 

—  of  noble  family,  171,  172 

—  subserviency  of,  41 

—  surrender  of,  245 

—  Victorian,  17 1-2 10 
Black  Bartholomew,  30,  32 
Blomneld  (Bp.  C.  J.),  177-9,  230, 

231 

Body  (Rev.  G.),  293 
Boniface  VIII,  332 
Boyne  Hill,  297 
Bradford,  297,  298 

—  S.  Jude's,  290-6 

—  S.  Mary  Magd.,  295 
Bramhall  (Archbp.  J.),  63 
Bratton  Clovelly,  344 
Bray,  Vicar  of,  16 
Bridestowe,  341-3 

Bristol,  S.  Raphael's,  255,  256 
Broad  Church,  368-90 
Broken  Road,  The,  350,  351 
Brougham  (Lord),  236,  237 
Browne  (Bp.  H.),  182,  345 
Bucer  (Martin),  2,  5,  6,  12,  337 
Buckeridge  (J.),  55 
Buller  (Rev.  A.),  343 
Bullinger  (H.),  12,  18 
Burleigh  (Lord),  12,  18 


409 


410 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Burnett  (Bp.  Gilb.),  38-40 

Cagots,  54 
Calamy  (E.),  33,  36 
Calvin  (J.),  5 

Calvinism,  15,  27,  46,  52,  75,  76, 
78-80,  84,  87,  88,  105,  392,  397, 
398 

—  moribund,  76,  105 

—  restrained,  18 

Cambridge  Camden  Soc.,  168,  169 

—  progress  in,  346 
Campbell  (Miss),  219,  220 
Candles  on  altar,  21,  22,  37,  238, 

239,  246,  346 
Cantelupe  (Bp.  Thos.),  114 
Cartwright  (Th.),  18,  19 
Casaubon  (Isaac),  56 
Case  (Rev.  E.),  273,  275 
Cazenove  (Rev.  E.),  273 
Chandler  (Bp.),  116 
Channel  Islands,  46 
Charity  children,  145 
Charles  II,  63,  70 
Child  (Rev.),  222,  223 
Cholera,  217-9,  279-81 
Christian  Year,  The,  75 
Church  Association,  238,  241,  248, 

256-9 

—  building,  140,  359,  360 

—  of  England  Men's  Soc,  357,  358 

—  Missionary  Soc,  167 

—  rates,  330 
Church  Songs,  403 
Church  Unions,  67 

—  wealth  of,  115,  116 
Clapham,  103,  104 
Classes,  19 

Claughton  (Bp.  of  Colombo),  208 

—  (Bp.  T.  L.),  139,  207,  208,  292-5 
Clayton  (Rev.),  88 
Clementines ,  The,  326 

Close  (Dean),  169 
Cock  Robin  ?    Who  killed,  262 
Colenso  (Bp.  T.  W.),  355.  376 
Collier  (Jeremy),  41 
Collins  (Rev.  R.),  204,  288 
Colombo,  208 

Colonial  and  Continental  Soc,  394, 
395 

—  Bishops,  106-8,  201,  202,  351, 
352 

Communion  Service,  choral,  57-61 
Companion  to  the  Altar,  65 
Compton  (Bp.  H.),  39 
Conceived  Prayers,  34 
Confession,  16,  32,  55,  56,  221-4, 

237,  276,  282,  285,  297-308,  315, 

316        ^    «M  1 
Confessions^of  a\Clergyman,  387 


Confirmations,  130,  131,  138 
Conformists,  16,  22,  23,  24,  30-36, 

39,  42,  53>  62,  71,  78 
Congress  (Church),  255 
Constitution,  Apostolic,  399 
Convocation,  restored,  353,  354 

—  suppressed,  50,  352,  353 
Copes,  17,  25,  37 
Cornwall,  morals  in,  86,  341 

—  progress  in,  339-41 
Corruption  of  man's  nature,  83,  84 
Coryton,  125 

Cosin  (Bp.  J.),  63 
Coulevin  (Pierre  de),  169 
Courtenay  (Vise  W.),  124 
Covenant,  24,  25 
Coverley,  Sir  Roger  de,  51,  74 
Cowley  Fathers,  308,  350 
Cox  (Bp.),  126 

Cranmer  (Archbp.),  2,  4,  5,  61,  399 
Crawley  (Rev.  S.),  276,  285 
Cuddesdon,  175 
Cumming  (Dr.),  147 
Cunningham  (Rev.  J.  M.),  97-9,  122 

—  (Marchioness  of),  172 
Curate,  described,  124 
Curates,  115,  116 

—  inhibition  of,  181,  182,  190 

Dale  (Rev.  T.  P.),  241,  258 
Davys  (Bp.  G.),  173 
Declaration  of  Clergy,  66,  67 

 Exeter  clergy,  67,  68 

 Laity,  67 

Decretals,  forged,  328 
Decretum  of  Gratian,  328 
Degradation  of  English  Church,  70, 
77 

Demonstration  against  Welsh  Dis- 
establishment Bill,  349 
Denison  (Bp.  E.),  212 

—  (Archd.  G.  A.),  237 
Denmark,  Church  in,  399 
Depravity  of  man's  nature,  85 
Deprivations  under  Charles  II,  30, 

31 

 Elizabeth,  10,  11,  18 

 Mary,  6,  7 

 Parliament,  21,  22,  26 

 William  and  Mary,  40 

Dickens  (Chas.),  101 
Dickenson  (W.),  114,  115 
Directory,  22,  30 
Disraeli,  Benj.,  177,  193,  209,  260 
Dodsworth  (Rev.  W.),  91,  271,  335 
Dress  of  clergy,  149-51 
Dryander,  4,  5 

Dupin's  Commonitorinm ,  163 
Durham  Letter,  230 
Duty,  81,  82,  121 


INDEX 


411 


Dykes  (Rev.  Dr.),  254,  255 

Eastward  position,  59,  60 ,  239,  356 
Ecdesiologist,  The,  168 
Eddowes  (Rev.  J.),  292,  295,  296 
Edward  VI,  1-6 

Ejection  of  clergy.  See  Deprivation 
Elford  (Rev.  W.),  128 
Elizabeth  (Queen),  6,  9,  12,  14,  16, 
398 

Ellicott  (Bp.  C.  J.),  183,  255,  256 
Elmhirst  (Rev.  G.),  267,  268 
Emmanuel  Coll.,  Cambridge,  13 
English  Church  Union,  301,  350, 

358,  359 
Enraght  (Rev.  R.  W.),  241 
Enthusiasm,  cooling  down  of,  360, 

36i 

Erasmus,  Commentary  of,  3 
Erastianism,  41,  71,  157,  161,  191, 

192,  211,  385 
Eucharist,  position  of,  61,  337 
Evangelical  movement,  78-211 
Evangelicals,  80-1 11,  162,  211,  348 

—  debt  due  to,  103,  105,  106 

—  decline  of,  108,  109 
Evangelische  Kirche,  313,  381-3, 

39o,  399.  400 
Evolution,  396 
Exeter,  progress  in,  345,  346 

—  synod  of,  67,  68 

—  use  of,  60,  61 
Extempore  prayers,  34 

Faber  (Rev.  F.  W.),  91,  322,  335 
Fagius,  5 

Fasting  communion,  72,  7$ 
Faux  Bourdons,  365,  366 
Felton  (Bp.),  55 
Festing  (Bp.),  304 
Ffoulkes  (Rev.  E.  S.),  321 
Fletcher  of  Madeley  (G.),  45,  87 
Forbes  (Rev.  A.  P.),  275 
Foreigners  in  the  Ministry,  45,  46 
Forgeries,  Papal,  328,  329 
Fowler  (W.),  72,  73 
Fox-hunting  parsons,  136,  137,  361 
Fraser  (Bp.  J.),  195-8,  207,  246, 
248-50 

Friend,   Sir   John,   and    Sir  W. 

Parkyns,  41 
Frog  barometer,  392 
Froude  (J.  A.),  120,  371 

—  (J.H.),  160,  163 

Galileo,  330 
Garrod  (H.  ML),  389 
George's-in-the-East  (S.),  232-7 
Germany,  Electoral  Bishops,  310, 
3ii 


Germany,  Evangelical  Church  in, 

3i3»  381-3,  39o,  399, 400 
Gilbert  (Bp.  A.  T.),  176,  224,  225, 

229 

Gladstone's  appointments,  194,  207 
Gorham  Judgment,  67,  283,  314, 

315,  353 
Gospels,  374 
Gould,  Madam,  73,  74 
Granville  (Archd.),   32,   34,  35-7, 

63 

Green  (Rev.  S.  F.),  246-9 
Greenwell  (Rev.  N.),  306 
Gregory  VII,  328 

—  XVI,  331 
Grindal  (Archbp.),  8 
Grotius  (Hugo),  79 
Guild  of  S.  Alban,  350 
Gunning  (Peter),  63 

Hackett  (Bp.  J.),  63 
Hamilton  (Bp.  W.  K.),  179,  180,  212 
Hammond  (H.),  63 
Hampden  (Bp.  R.  D.),  211 
Hanoverian  period,  51,  52,  66,  124, 
127 

Harvest  Thanksgivings,  184 
Hatcham,  S.  James's,  241-5 
Hatchard  (Rev.  J.),  217,  221,  222 
Hats,  prayed  into,  140 

—  worn  in  church,  22,  38 
Henson  (Dean  H.),  387 
Herbert  (Geo.),  55 
Herriot,  122 

Heylin  (Peter),  17,  55 
Heywood  (Nath.),  32 
Hinds  (Bp.  S.),  177 
Hoadly  (Bp.  B.),  353 
Holborn,  S.  Alban's,  258 
Hole  (Dean),  129 
Holgate  (Archbp.),  2,  5 
Holy  Table,  carved,  57 

 position  of,  13,  17,  21,  22,  37, 

61.62 
Homilies,  Book  of,  3 
Honeyman  (Rev.  C.),  147,  148 
Hood  (Tom),  100 

Hook  (Dr.  W.  F.),  267-9, 272~4.  276, 

281,  284 
Hooker  (R.),  14,  55 
Hooper  (Bp.),  12 
Horneck  (Ant.),  63 
Horsley  (Bp.  S.),  66 
Howell  (Rev.  H.),  341-3 
Hudson  (W.  H.),  339,  340 
Huguenots,  42-6,  53,  54,  78 
Humphry  Clmkcr,  169,  170 
Hurstpierpoint,  138 
Hymnals,  366 
Hymns,  106 


412 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Iceland,  16 
Idolatry,  104 
Ignatius  (Brother),  356 
Impeccability,  82 
Imputed  righteousness,  83 
Incarnation,  373-5 
Incense,  37 

InfaUibihty  of  the  Church,  371, 
373,  374 

 Scriptures,  70,  71,  371,  373, 

374 

Inhibition  of  curates,  181,  182,  190 
Innocent  III,  329 

—  VIII,  330 
Interdict,  255 

Invasion  from  Channel  Islands,  46 

—  from  Palatinate,  47-81 

—  Irish,  49 

—  of  foreign  heretics,  2,  4,  5,  7, 
42-8,  49,  78 

—  Scottish,  48,  49,  78 
Irish  Church,  364 

—  Fever,  275,  277-9 
Irvingites,  146,  147 

Jackson  (Bp.  J.),  180,  303 
James  I,  19,  56 
Jermyn  (Bp.),  208 
Jerusalem  Bishopric,  312-4 
Jeune  (Bp.  F.),  186 
Jewel's  Apology,  14 
John's  (S.)  College,  Oxford,  11 
Julius  II,  329 

Keble  (Rev.  J.),  75,  91,  149,  159, 

163,  271 
Kelham  Fathers,  357 
Ken  (Bp.Thos.),33,38,53 
Kettlewell,  63 
Kidder  (Bp.  R.),  33 
King  (Rev.  Bryan),  232-5 

—  (Bp.  E.),  256,  257 
Kingsley  (Rev.  C),  384 
Knott  (Rev.  J.  W.),  288 
Knox  (John),  2,  8 

Labouchere  family,  47 
Latent  heat,  74,  75 
Latitudinarians,  39-41,  53,  64,  78, 

161,  211,  237,  370,  383,  401 
Laud  (Archbp.),  18,  55,  62 
Lawlessness,  257,  263-5 
Lectureships,  17,  18,  35,  232 
Lee  (Bp.  P.),  179,  211 
Leeds,  S.  Saviour's,  266-89 
Leo  I,  327 

—  X,  330,  334 

—  XIII,  330 

Liber  Pontificalis ,  328 


Liberius,  Pope,  332 

Liddell  (Hon.  and  Rev.  R.),  231, 

239 

Liddon  (Rev.  Canon),  244,  260 
Little  Bo-Peep,  288,  289 
Littledale  (Rev.  Dr.),  176,  177,  303 
Liturgies  compared,  399-401 
Liverpool,  progress  in,  347 
—  S.  Margaret's,  250-3 
Lloyd  (Bp.  C),  159 
Longley  (C.  T.,  Bp.  and  Archbp.), 

269-71,  276,  281-5,  355 
Loretto,  329 

Lowder  (Rev.  C.  F.),  231,  233 
Lumncott,  73 
Lunn  (H.  E.),  1 1 1 
Lydford,  127 

Maccabees,  77 

Mackonochie  (Rev.  A.  H.),  234,  239, 

258,  259,  293 
Maclagan  (Archbp.),  48 
Macmullen  (Rev.  R.),  273,  274 
McNeile  (Dean),  49,  301 
Magee  (Bp.  and  Archbp.),  49,  193, 

194 

Majendie  (Bp.),  116 

Malignancy,  21 

Mallet  (J.  L.),  his  diary,  95-9 

Manchester,  246-50 

Manning  (Card.),  91,  315,  322-35 

Margaret  Street  Chapel,  229 

Marionette  Dancer,  The,  200 

Marriott  (Rev.  C),  271,  287 

Marsh  (Bp.),  131 

Mary  I  (Queen),  4,  6,  7,  14 

Mary  Tavy,  343 

Matins  and  Vespers,  336 

Maurice  (Rev.  J.  F.  D.),  384,  385 

Mediocrities,  199-201,  404-7 

Mendoza,  1 1 

Merbecke,  11,  57,  59 

Merueis,  393 

Miles  Platting,  196,  245-50 
Millenary  petition,  19 
Mills  (Danl.),  28,  29,  32,  33 
Minster  (Rev.  T.),  275-7,  281-6 
Mirfield  Fathers,  308,  357 
Mitford  (Miss),  69,  129 
Monk  (Rev.  W.  E.),  278 
Moore  (Archbp.),  116 
More  (Hannah),  105,  129 
Moustaches,  151 
Musgrove  (Archbp.),  179 
Music  (Church),  365,  366,  402,  403 
Mycronius  (M.),  5 

Neale  (Rev.  J.  M.),  224-9,  3°6 
Nelson  (Robt.),  63,  65,  75 
Nepotism,  116-8,  183,  209 


INDEX 


413 


Newman  (Card.  J.  H.),  53,  91,  149, 
159,  162,  163,  271,  286,  289,  322, 

335.  398 
Newton  (Rev.  J.),  88 
Nicolas  I,  328 
Nigellinus  (M.),  5 
Nile,  399 

Nonconformists,  28,  35 
Non-communicating  attendance, 

337 

Non-jurors,  40 

Non-residence,  113,  116,  117,  128, 
129 

North  side,  61,  62,  139 
Northumberland,  Duke  of,  1,2 
Norway,  Church  in,  399 

Oakeley  (Rev.  F.),  91,  165,  229 

Oath  of  Supremacy,  10 

Ochino  (Bern.),  2,  5 

Omphalopsychae,  80 

Orders,  Anglican,  7,  330,  366,  367 

Ordination,  preparation  for,  131, 

203,  204 
Organs  destroyed,  23 
Ornaments  Rubric,  13,  98,  238,  247 
Orthodox  clergy, 51, 53, 66,  71,  75,82 
Outram  (Wm.),  33 
Overall  (Bp.),  58 

Paget  (SirW.),  6 

Palmer  (Rev.  W.),  66,  160 

—  (Rev.  W.  J.),  69,  70 

—  (Sir  Wm.),  1 59 

Palmerston    Bishops,   179,  180-9, 

199,  201,  203 
Pan- Anglican  synods,  355,  356 
Parish  churches,  neglect  of,  135 
Parker  (Archbp.),  17 

—  (Rev.  F.),  73 

—  (Saml.),  33 

Parsons,  hunting,  136,  137,  361 

—  Lincolnshire,  177 
Parsons,  Robert,  11,  56 
Parsons,  squires,  1 36 
Patronage,  50,  51,  120 
Pearson  (Bp.  J.),  23,  28 
Peel  Bishops,  174,  176,  199 
Pelham  (Bp.  J.  T.),  184,  185 
Penzance    (Lord),    241-4,  247-9, 

252,  253,  259,  261 
Pepys  (Saml.),  28,  29,  32,  37 
Percival  (Rev.),  160 
Percy  (Bp.),  117 
Perowne  (Bp.  J.  E.),  187,  188 
Peter  Martyr,  2,  5,  8 
Pew-opener,  140,  141,  143 
Pews,  141 

Phillpotts  (Bp.  Henry),  123,  209, 
210,  212-5,  221 


Philpot  (Bp.),  187 
Pius  IX,  331 

—  X,  330 

Plain  Song,  60,  365,  366 
Plato,  1 10,  in 

Pluralism,  113-8,  123,  124,  127-9 
Plymouth,  progress  in,  349 

—  S.  Andrew's,  344 

i  —  S.  Peter's,  216,  224,  244,  245 
Pocock  (Edm.),  26 
Poitiers,  Battle  of,  390 
Pollen  (Rev.  J.  H.),  275,  279,  281-3, 
286 

Potter  (Archbp.),  116 
Powys  (Bp.),  180 
Poynet  (Bp.),  5 
■  Praed  (W.  M.),  122 
Prayer  Book,  first  of  Ed  ward  j  VI, 
1,  3>  6,  7 

 second  of  Edward  \  I,  5,  6, 

8 

 revision  of  1661,  29,  30 

J  Revision  Soc,  93,  94 

 suppressed,  22 

Preaching,  106,  376 

—  forbidden,  4 

Presbyterianism  established,  25 
Presentment  of  churchwardens,  19, 

20 

Pretyman  (Bp.),  117 
Priest  in  Absolution,  300,  301 
Privy  Council,  Court  of,  238,  240-2, 
247-58 

 prosecutions  before,  239,  240 

Processions,  138,  139 
Progress,  338-67 
Prophesyings,  19 

Proprietary-  chapels,  141,  143,  147, 
148 

Protestantism,  decay   of  abroad, 

52 

Prynne  (Rev.  G.  R.),  216-24 
Public   Worship   Regulation  Act, 

240-2,  246,  265 
Pulla:n  (Val.),  2 
Purchas  (Rev.),  239,  240,  259 
Puritan  demands,  9,  14 

—  grievances,  20,  21,  29,  39,  79 
Puritanism,  16,  17-19,  20-7 
Pusey  (Rev.  Dr.  E.  P.),  91,  269,  270, 

286-8 

—  Lucy,  269,  270 

Queen  Anne's  Bounty,  119 

Redesdale,  Lord,  301,  307 
Reform  Bill,  66,  129,  161 
Refugee  reformers,  2,  4,  5,  7,  8.  See 
Huguenots 
i  from  Switzerland,  47 


414 


THE  CHURCH  REVIVAL 


Refugee  reformers  from  the  Palati- 
nate, 47,  48 
Religious  Orders,  356 
Restoration,  the,  28,  30 
—  of  churches,  37 
"  Returned  empties,"  107,  108 
Revolution,  the,  38 
Reykjahlid,  26,  27 
Richards  (Rev.  U.),  271 
Ritualism,  rise  of,  238,  260,  272 
Road  murder,  298,  299 
Romaine  (Rev.  W.),  80,  86 
Romanizers,  164,  165,  336 
Rood,  25 

Rood-screens,  56,  57,  135,  342 
Rooke  (Rev.  S),  276,  277,  285 
Rose  (Rev.  H.  J.),  160 
Russell,    bishops    appointed  by 

Lord  John,  176,  179,  199,  211 
Ryan  (Bp.),  294,  295 
Ryle  (Bp.  J.  C),  194,  195,  251,  261 

Sackingen,  305 
Sackville  College,  224-6 
Sale  of  Livings,  118,  119 
Sardica,  Council  of,  326,  327 
Sargasso  Sea,  377 
Savoy  Conference,  29 
Seamier  (Bp.),  126 
Scobell  (Rev.  J.),  226-8 
Scots  in  the  Ministry,  48,  49,  78 
Secessions,  91,  167,  175,  274,  283, 
286,  287 

Secularization  of  the  clergy,  361, 
362 

Selwyn  (Bp.  G.  A.),  186 
Sermons,  106,  15 1-6 
Shaftesbury  (Lord),  94,  170,  240, 
300 

Sharp  (Archbp.),  63 

Sheepstor,  131,  132 

Sherlock  (Bp.),  116 

Sibthorp  (Rev.  R.  W.),  91,  167,  335 

Simcoe  (Rev.  H.  A.),  10 1,  102 

Simeon  (Rev.  C),  91,  92 

Simeonite  Trustees,  92,  104,  394 

Sisterhoods,  356 

Sixtus  V,  330,  331 

Slatter  (Rev.  J.),  267 

Soho,  Huguenot  chapels  in,  46 

Somerset,  Protector,  1,  4,  5,  6 

Sowden  (Canon),  396 

Sparke  (Bp.),  117 

Spider  and  Fly,  The,  253 

Spoliation  of  Church,  125-7 

Spurious  quotations,  229 

Spurrell  (Rev.  J.),  219 

Stamford,  129 

Stanley  (Dean),  237,  385-7 

Stillingfleet](Bp.),  39 


Stoke  Newington  riots,  237 
Stoles  (coloured),  180,  181,  190,  234 
Suffragan  Bishops,  352 
Sumner  (Bp.  C),  172,  173 

—  (Archbp.  J.  B.),  173,  177 
Sunday  Schools,  105 
Supremacy  of  Crown,  10 
Surplice  riots,  214,  215 
Surphced  choirs,  402 

Tait  (Archbp.  A.  C),  48,  71,  164, 
168,  189-92,  202,  209,  234,  235, 
237,  240,  241,  248,  261,  355,  356 

Tahacotian  process,  52 

Tarpeia,  389 

Tavistock,  70 

Taylor  (Jeremy),  64,  333 

Teasdale  (Rev.  J.),  122 

Ten  Commandments,  272 

Tenison  (Archbp.),  39 

Test  Act,  35 

Thackeray  (W.  M.),  104,  148,  198 
Thirlwall  (Bp.  C),  355 
Thomas  (Rev.  C),  128 
Thomson  (Archbp.  W.),  48,  71,  182, 
183,  203,  205-7,  248,  250,  259,  261 
Thorndike,  63 

Thorold  (Bp.  A.  M.),  188,  189 
Tillotson  (Archbp.  J.),  33,  39,  41 
Time  of  services,  61 
Tithe  Commutation  Act,  119,  338 
Tooth  (Rev.  A.),  241-5 
Toplady  (Rev.  A.  M.),  80,  99,  100 
Toxteth  Park,  250-3 
Tract- writers,  71,  77,  162-4 
Tracts  for  the  Times,  161-4,  212 
Tremellius,  4 
Tryers,  The,  26,  30 
Tully  (Thos.),  33 

—  (Timothy),  33 
Tyndale's  Bible,  3 

Ugliness,  Cult  of,  169,  170,  340,  341 
Ulm,  403 

Undenominationahsm,  40,  41,  80, 

158,  172,  383,  389 
Unleavened  bread,  17,  399 

Valentinian  III,  327 
Valpy  (Rev.  Dr.),  123 
Venn  (Rev.  H.),  87,  92 

—  (Rev.  J.),  87,  88 

Verbal  inspiration,   90,  105,  109, 

no,  369.  37o 
Via  media,  391-407 
Villiers  (Bp.  H.  M.),  183 
Virginal  Birth,  375,  376 
Visiting,  parochial,  92 
Volksmesse,  402 
Vossius  (Isaac),  43 


INDEX 


415 


Wagner  (Rev.  A.),  299 

Waldegrave  (Bp.  S.),  184 

Ward  (Rev.  R.),  273-5,  283,  286 

Ward's  Ideal,  164,  165,  322 

Washneld,  341,  342 

Washington  Irving,  124 

Week's  Preparation,  64 

Wells  (H.  G.),  368 

Wesley  (Rev.  John),  78,  87 

West  (Jane),  65 

Whately  (Archbp.  R.),  158 

Whitefield  (Rev.  Geo.),  80,  85,  86 

Whole  Duty  of  Man,  64 

Wigram  (Bp;  J.  C),  188 

Wilberforce  (Bp.  S.),  174-6,  182, 

183,  297,  298,  354,  386,  387,  397 
—  (Wm.),  87 


William  III,  33,  38-42,  50,  63,  70, 
74,  77 

Williams  (Rev.  Isaac),  91,  162,  163, 
271 

Wilson  (Bp.  D.),  63-5 
Witchcraft,  330 
Wordsworth  (Bp.  C),  209,  352 
Worldliness,  85,  86 
Wrangham  (Archd.),  66 
Wren  (Bp.  M.),  55,  63 

Year  of  stress,  259,  260,  261 
Young  (Rev.  P.),  172 

Zosimus  (Pope),  326 
Zurich  Letters,  8 
Zwinglianism,  3,  5,  75,  398 


PRINTED  BY 
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LONDON  AND  AYLESBURY. 


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